LEE & JACKSON CHANCELLORSVILLE by Robert Wilson - Signed print LIMITED EDITION

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Seller: scmbgetty ✉️ (8,963) 100%, Location: Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, US, Ships to: US & many other countries, Item: 145674316202 LEE & JACKSON CHANCELLORSVILLE by Robert Wilson - Signed print LIMITED EDITION.

LEE AND JACKSON BEFORE CHANCELLORSVILLE - By Robert Wilson, Sr. This is a Signed, Limited Edition of only 1,000 Prints. Measures 31" X 24"  and in MINT Condition.  Unframed and un-matted. Published originally in 1980 and long ago sold out. To see a photo of the full print you will have to GOOGLE the print name and artist because LIBERAL REVISIONIST HISTORY ebay will not allow photos of Confederate Flags on their site. Apparently this will erase the Confederate Flag from history (SIC). Insured USPS delivery in the continental US in a large diameter tube. Will ship worldwide.  

Mr. Wilson taught himself to paint with oil on canvas. Over the next 50 years he recorded the History of America and the Biblical record of the life of Jesus with incredible attention to detail, accuracy and realism.  Many of Robert’s works are monumental in size and adorn the walls of government buildings, military parks, state parks, colleges, churches, and historical museums in the United States.  He continues to paint at age 96 in Woodruff, South Carolina.

Robert’s first series of art “Jesus Journey on Earth”, propelled his art career with over 20 paintings (each 7 feet by 5 feet). The Jesus Journey series was first unveiled by President Jimmy Carter at the Washington Hilton for the National Prayer Breakfast in 1978. The twenty paintings in this book were donated to Liberty University in 2016, providing a great home for these incredible original works of art.

Although he is famous for his vivid life size depictions of Christ’s life and the history of the Revolutionary War, Civil War, WW I & II and History of Aviation, Robert also created several portraits of famous NASCAR Drivers; Fireball Roberts, Richard Petty & Dale Earnhardt, Sr. He painted portraits of people he admired such as; Christian Broadcasting Network founder, Pat Robertson (w/his horse Ufano), Lady Diana, Duchess of York “Fergie” and Hillary Clinton. His portraits include actors & actresses; Tonya Roberts, Elizabeth Montgomery, John Wayne, and Chris Templeton. Robert captured in paint the artists he admired; Salvador Dali, Norman Rockwell, and Albert Einstein.

Robert’s second series (the Revolutionary War) included over 40 paintings, including the famous Battle of Cowpens and the Battle of Kings Mountain.  The South Carolina State House is the permanent home for those two famous battle scenes.  The SC State Museum is home for a large painting of Nathanael Greene’s Army.  The Revolutionary War series of paintings earned Mr. Wilson the first “Daniel Morgan Award” on January 17, 1981 for his contributions to South Carolina’s History.

In 2007 Jim DeMint, SC Senator, presented Mr. Wilson with the distinguished “Silver Star” for his efforts as a pilot in WWII dropping troops into Normandy (he retired a Major in the Army after the Korean War).  Then on January 19, 2017  Nikki Haley, Governor of SC, awarded Mr. Wilson with the highest civilian honor in the State of SC the “Order of the Palmetto”, a first for an artist.

Robert Edward Lee (January 19, 1807 – October 12, 1870) was an American Confederate general best known as a commander of the Confederate States Army during the American Civil War. He commanded the Army of Northern Virginia from 1862 until its surrender in 1865 and earned a reputation as a skilled tactician.

A son of Revolutionary War officer Henry "Light Horse Harry" Lee III, Lee was a top graduate of the United States Military Academy and an exceptional officer and military engineer in the United States Army for 32 years. During this time, he served throughout the United States, distinguished himself during the Mexican–American War, and served as Superintendent of the United States Military Academy. He was also the husband of Mary Anna Custis Lee, adopted great-granddaughter of George Washington. When Virginia's 1861 Richmond Convention declared secession from the Union, Lee chose to follow his home state, despite his desire for the country to remain intact and an offer of a senior Union command. During the first year of the Civil War, he served in minor combat operations and as a senior military adviser to Confederate President Jefferson Davis.

Lee took command of the Army of Northern Virginia in June 1862 during the Peninsula Campaign following the wounding of Joseph E. Johnston. He succeeded in driving the Union Army of the Potomac under George B. McClellan away from the Confederate capital of Richmond during the Seven Days Battles, although he was unable to destroy McClellan's army. Lee then overcame Union forces under John Pope at the Second Battle of Bull Run in August. His invasion of Maryland that September ended with the inconclusive Battle of Antietam, after which he retreated to Virginia. Lee then won two decisive victories at Fredericksburg and Chancellorsville before launching a second invasion of the North in the summer of 1863, where he was decisively defeated at the Battle of Gettysburg by the Army of the Potomac under George Meade. He led his army in the minor and inconclusive Bristoe Campaign that fall before General Ulysses S. Grant took command of Union armies in the spring of 1864. Grant engaged Lee's army in bloody but inconclusive battles at the Wilderness and Spotsylvania before the lengthy Siege of Petersburg, which was followed in April 1865 by the capture of Richmond and the destruction of most of Lee's army, which he finally surrendered to Grant at Appomattox Court House.

In 1865, Lee became president of Washington College (later Washington and Lee University) in Lexington, Virginia; in that position, he supported reconciliation between North and South. Lee accepted "the extinction of slavery" provided for by the Thirteenth Amendment, but opposed racial equality for African Americans. After his death in 1870, Lee became a cultural icon in the South and is largely hailed as one of the Civil War's greatest generals. As commander of the Army of Northern Virginia, he fought most of his battles against armies of significantly larger size, and managed to win many of them. Lee built up a collection of talented subordinates, most notably James Longstreet, Stonewall Jackson, and J. E. B. Stuart, who along with Lee were critical to the Confederacy's battlefield success.[1][2] In spite of his success, his two major strategic offensives into Union territory both ended in failure. Lee's aggressive and risky tactics, especially at Gettysburg, which resulted in high casualties at a time when the Confederacy had a shortage of manpower, have come under criticism.[3] Almost 110 years after the conclusion of the Civil War and his denial for amnesty by Secretary of State William Seward, Lee was officially pardoned by President Gerald Ford, and given a posthumous restoration of his full rights of citizenship.

Contents

1 Early life and education

2 Military engineer career

3 Marriage and family

4 Mexican–American War

5 Early 1850s: West Point and Texas

6 Late 1850s: Arlington plantation and the Custis slaves

6.1 The Norris case

6.2 Lee's views on race and slavery

7 Harpers Ferry and return to Texas, 1859–1861

7.1 Harpers Ferry

7.2 Texas

8 Civil War

8.1 Resignation from United States Army

8.2 Early role

8.3 Commander, Army of Northern Virginia (June 1862 – June 1863)

8.4 Battle of Gettysburg

8.5 Ulysses S. Grant and the Union offensive

8.6 General in Chief

9 Summaries of Lee's Civil War battles

10 Postbellum life

10.1 President Johnson's amnesty pardons

10.2 Postwar politics

11 Illness and death

12 Legacy

12.1 Monuments, memorials and commemorations

13 Dates of rank

14 In popular culture

15 See also

16 References

17 Bibliography

17.1 Historiography

18 Further reading

19 External links

19.1 Primary sources

19.2 Monuments and memorials

Early life and education

Stratford Hall, Westmoreland County

the family seat, Lee's birthplace

Oronoco Street, Alexandria, Virginia

"Lee Corner" properties

Lee was born at Stratford Hall Plantation in Westmoreland County, Virginia, to Henry Lee III and Anne Hill Carter Lee on January 19, 1807.[4] His ancestor, Richard Lee I, emigrated from Shropshire, England to Virginia in 1639.[5]

Lee's father suffered severe financial reverses from failed investments[6] and was put in debtors' prison. Soon after his release the following year, the family moved to Alexandria, Virginia, both because there were then high quality local schools there, and because several members of Anne's extended family lived nearby.[7] In 1811, the family, including the newly born sixth child, Mildred, moved to a house on Oronoco Street.[8]

In 1812 Lee's father moved permanently to the West Indies.[9] Lee attended Eastern View, a school for young gentlemen, in Fauquier County, Virginia, and then at the Alexandria Academy, free for local boys, where he showed an aptitude for mathematics. Although brought up to be a practicing Christian, he was not confirmed in the Episcopal Church until age 46.[10]

Anne Lee's family was often supported by a relative, William Henry Fitzhugh, who owned the Oronoco Street house and allowed the Lees to stay at his country home Ravensworth. Fitzhugh wrote to United States Secretary of War, John C. Calhoun, urging that Robert be given an appointment to the United States Military Academy at West Point. Fitzhugh had young Robert deliver the letter.[11] Lee entered West Point in the summer of 1825. At the time, the focus of the curriculum was engineering; the head of the United States Army Corps of Engineers supervised the school and the superintendent was an engineering officer. Cadets were not permitted leave until they had finished two years of study, and were rarely allowed off the Academy grounds. Lee graduated second in his class, behind only Charles Mason[12] (who resigned from the Army a year after graduation). Lee did not incur any demerits during his four-year course of study, a distinction shared by five of his 45 classmates. In June 1829, Lee was commissioned a brevet second lieutenant in the Corps of Engineers.[13] After graduation, while awaiting assignment, he returned to Virginia to find his mother on her deathbed; she died at Ravensworth on July 26, 1829.[14]

Ancestors of Robert E. Lee

Military engineer career

Lee at age 31 in 1838, as a Lieutenant of Engineers in the U.S. Army

On August 11, 1829, Brigadier General Charles Gratiot ordered Lee to Cockspur Island, Georgia. The plan was to build a fort on the marshy island which would command the outlet of the Savannah River. Lee was involved in the early stages of construction as the island was being drained and built up.[15] In 1831, it became apparent that the existing plan to build what became known as Fort Pulaski would have to be revamped, and Lee was transferred to Fort Monroe at the tip of the Virginia Peninsula (today in Hampton, Virginia).[16][citation not found]

While home in the summer of 1829, Lee had apparently courted Mary Custis whom he had known as a child. Lee obtained permission to write to her before leaving for Georgia, though Mary Custis warned Lee to be "discreet" in his writing, as her mother read her letters, especially from men.[17] Custis refused Lee the first time he asked to marry her; her father did not believe the son of the disgraced Light Horse Harry Lee was a suitable man for his daughter.[18] She accepted him with her father's consent in September 1830, while he was on summer leave,[19] and the two were wed on June 30, 1831.[20]

Lee's duties at Fort Monroe were varied, typical for a junior officer, and ranged from budgeting to designing buildings.[21][citation not found] Although Mary Lee accompanied her husband to Hampton Roads, she spent about a third of her time at Arlington, though the couple's first son, Custis Lee was born at Fort Monroe. Although the two were by all accounts devoted to each other, they were different in character: Robert Lee was tidy and punctual, qualities his wife lacked. Mary Lee also had trouble transitioning from being a rich man's daughter to having to manage a household with only one or two slaves.[22] Beginning in 1832, Robert Lee had a close but platonic relationship with Harriett Talcott, wife of his fellow officer Andrew Talcott.[23]

Fort Monroe, Hampton

Lee's early duty station

Fort Des Moines, Montrose

Lee's hand-drawn sketch

Life at Fort Monroe was marked by conflicts between artillery and engineering officers. Eventually the War Department transferred all engineering officers away from Fort Monroe, except Lee, who was ordered to take up residence on the artificial island of Rip Raps across the river from Fort Monroe, where Fort Wool would eventually rise, and continue work to improve the island. Lee duly moved there, then discharged all workers and informed the War Department he could not maintain laborers without the facilities of the fort.[24]

In 1834, Lee was transferred to Washington as General Gratiot's assistant.[25] Lee had hoped to rent a house in Washington for his family, but was not able to find one; the family lived at Arlington, though Lieutenant Lee rented a room at a Washington boarding house for when the roads were impassable.[26][citation not found] In mid-1835, Lee was assigned to assist Andrew Talcott in surveying the southern border of Michigan.[27] While on that expedition, he responded to a letter from an ill Mary Lee, which had requested he come to Arlington, "But why do you urge my immediate return, & tempt one in the strongest manner[?] ... I rather require to be strengthened & encouraged to the full performance of what I am called on to execute."[16] Lee completed the assignment and returned to his post in Washington, finding his wife ill at Ravensworth. Mary Lee, who had recently given birth to their second child, remained bedridden for several months. In October 1836, Lee was promoted to first lieutenant.[28]

Lee served as an assistant in the chief engineer's office in Washington, D.C. from 1834 to 1837, but spent the summer of 1835 helping to lay out the state line between Ohio and Michigan. As a first lieutenant of engineers in 1837, he supervised the engineering work for St. Louis harbor and for the upper Mississippi and Missouri rivers. Among his projects was the mapping of the Des Moines Rapids on the Mississippi above Keokuk, Iowa, where the Mississippi's mean depth of 2.4 feet (0.7 m) was the upper limit of steamboat traffic on the river. His work there earned him a promotion to captain. Around 1842, Captain Robert E. Lee arrived as Fort Hamilton's post engineer.[29]

Marriage and family

Robert E. Lee, around age 38, and his son William Henry Fitzhugh Lee, around age 8, c.1845

While Lee was stationed at Fort Monroe, he married Mary Anna Randolph Custis (1808–1873), great-granddaughter of Martha Washington by her first husband Daniel Parke Custis, and step-great-granddaughter of George Washington, the first president of the United States. Mary was the only surviving child of George Washington Parke Custis, George Washington's stepgrandson, and Mary Lee Fitzhugh Custis, daughter of William Fitzhugh[30] and Ann Bolling Randolph. Robert and Mary married on June 30, 1831, at Arlington House, her parents' house just across the Potomac from Washington. The 3rd U.S. Artillery served as honor guard at the marriage. They eventually had seven children, three boys and four girls:[citation needed]

George Washington Custis Lee (Custis, "Boo"); 1832–1913; served as major general in the Confederate Army and aide-de-camp to President Jefferson Davis, captured during the Battle of Sailor's Creek; unmarried

Mary Custis Lee (Mary, "Daughter"); 1835–1918; unmarried

William Henry Fitzhugh Lee ("Rooney"); 1837–1891; served as major general in the Confederate Army (cavalry); married twice; surviving children by second marriage

Anne Carter Lee (Annie); June 18, 1839 – October 20, 1862; died of typhoid fever, unmarried

Eleanor Agnes Lee (Agnes); 1841 – October 15, 1873; died of tuberculosis, unmarried

Robert Edward Lee, Jr. (Rob); 1843–1914; served as captain in the Confederate Army (Rockbridge Artillery); married twice; surviving children by second marriage

Mildred Childe Lee (Milly, "Precious Life"); 1846–1905; unmarried

All the children survived him except for Annie, who died in 1862. They are all buried with their parents in the crypt of the Lee Chapel at Washington and Lee University in Lexington, Virginia.[citation needed]

Lee was a great-great-great-grandson of William Randolph and a great-great-grandson of Richard Bland.[31] He was also related to Helen Keller through Helen's mother, Kate, and was a distant relative of Admiral Willis Augustus Lee.[citation needed]

On May 1, 1864, General Lee was present at the baptism of General A.P. Hill's daughter, Lucy Lee Hill, to serve as her godfather. This is referenced in the painting Tender is the Heart by Mort Künstler.[32] He was also the godfather of actress and writer Odette Tyler, the daughter of brigadier general William Whedbee Kirkland.[33]

Mexican–American War

Robert E. Lee around age 43, when he was a brevet lieutenant-colonel of engineers, c. 1850

Lee distinguished himself in the Mexican–American War (1846–1848). He was one of Winfield Scott's chief aides in the march from Veracruz to Mexico City. He was instrumental in several American victories through his personal reconnaissance as a staff officer; he found routes of attack that the Mexicans had not defended because they thought the terrain was impassable.

He was promoted to brevet major after the Battle of Cerro Gordo on April 18, 1847.[34] He also fought at Contreras, Churubusco, and Chapultepec and was wounded at the last. By the end of the war, he had received additional brevet promotions to lieutenant colonel and colonel, but his permanent rank was still captain of engineers, and he would remain a captain until his transfer to the cavalry in 1855.

For the first time, Robert E. Lee and Ulysses S. Grant met and worked with each other during the Mexican–American War. Close observations of their commanders constituted a learning process for both Lee and Grant.[35] The Mexican–American War concluded on February 2, 1848.

After the Mexican War, Lee spent three years at Fort Carroll in Baltimore harbor. During this time, his service was interrupted by other duties, among them surveying and updating maps in Florida. Cuban revolutionary Narciso López intended to forcibly liberate Cuba from Spanish rule. In 1849, searching for a leader for his filibuster expedition, he approached Jefferson Davis, then a United States senator. Davis declined and suggested Lee, who also declined. Both decided it was inconsistent with their duties.[36][37]

Early 1850s: West Point and Texas

The 1850s were a difficult time for Lee, with his long absences from home, the increasing disability of his wife, troubles in taking over the management of a large slave plantation, and his often morbid concern with his personal failures.[38]

In 1852, Lee was appointed Superintendent of the Military Academy at West Point.[39] He was reluctant to enter what he called a "snake pit", but the War Department insisted and he obeyed. His wife occasionally came to visit. During his three years at West Point, Brevet Colonel Robert E. Lee improved the buildings and courses and spent much time with the cadets. Lee's oldest son, George Washington Custis Lee, attended West Point during his tenure. Custis Lee graduated in 1854, first in his class.[40]

Lee was enormously relieved to receive a long-awaited promotion as second-in-command of the 2nd Cavalry Regiment in Texas in 1855. It meant leaving the Engineering Corps and its sequence of staff jobs for the combat command he truly wanted. He served under Colonel Albert Sidney Johnston at Camp Cooper, Texas; their mission was to protect settlers from attacks by the Apache and the Comanche.

Late 1850s: Arlington plantation and the Custis slaves

Arlington House, Arlington

Mary Custis's inheritance in 1857

Christ Church, Alexandria, where the Lees worshiped

In 1857, his father-in-law George Washington Parke Custis died, creating a serious crisis when Lee took on the burden of executing the will. Custis's will encompassed vast landholdings and hundreds of slaves balanced against massive debts, and required Custis's former slaves "to be emancipated by my executors in such manner as to my executors may seem most expedient and proper, the said emancipation to be accomplished in not exceeding five years from the time of my decease."[41] The estate was in disarray, and the plantations had been poorly managed and were losing money.[42] Lee tried to hire an overseer to handle the plantation in his absence, writing to his cousin, "I wish to get an energetic honest farmer, who while he will be considerate & kind to the negroes, will be firm & make them do their duty."[43] But Lee failed to find a man for the job, and had to take a two-year leave of absence from the army in order to run the plantation himself.

Lee's more strict expectations and harsher punishments of the slaves on Arlington plantation nearly led to a slave revolt, since many of the slaves had been given to understand that they were to be made free as soon as Custis died, and protested angrily at the delay.[44] In May 1858, Lee wrote to his son Rooney, "I have had some trouble with some of the people. Reuben, Parks & Edward, in the beginning of the previous week, rebelled against my authority—refused to obey my orders, & said they were as free as I was, etc., etc.—I succeeded in capturing them & lodging them in jail. They resisted till overpowered & called upon the other people to rescue them."[43] Less than two months after they were sent to the Alexandria jail, Lee decided to remove these three men and three female house slaves from Arlington, and sent them under lock and key to the slave-trader William Overton Winston in Richmond, who was instructed to keep them in jail until he could find "good & responsible" slaveholders to work them until the end of the five-year period.[43]

By 1860 only one slave family was left intact on the estate. Some of the families had been together since their time at Mount Vernon.[45]

The Norris case

In 1859, three of the Arlington slaves—Wesley Norris, his sister Mary, and a cousin of theirs—fled for the North, but were captured a few miles from the Pennsylvania border and forced to return to Arlington. On June 24, 1859, the anti-slavery newspaper New York Daily Tribune published two anonymous letters (dated June 19, 1859[46] and June 21, 1859[47]), each claiming to have heard that Lee had the Norrises whipped, and each going so far as to claim that the overseer refused to whip the woman but that Lee took the whip and flogged her personally. Lee privately wrote to his son Custis that "The N. Y. Tribune has attacked me for my treatment of your grandfather's slaves, but I shall not reply. He has left me an unpleasant legacy."[48]

Wesley Norris himself spoke out about the incident after the war, in an 1866 interview printed in an abolitionist newspaper, the National Anti-Slavery Standard. Norris stated that after they had been captured, and forced to return to Arlington, Lee told them that "he would teach us a lesson we would not soon forget." According to Norris, Lee then had the three of them firmly tied to posts by the overseer, and ordered them whipped with fifty lashes for the men and twenty for Mary Norris. Norris claimed that Lee encouraged the whipping, and that when the overseer refused to do it, called in the county constable to do it instead. Unlike the anonymous letter writers, he does not state that Lee himself whipped any of the slaves. According to Norris, Lee "frequently enjoined [Constable] Williams to 'lay it on well,' an injunction which he did not fail to heed; not satisfied with simply lacerating our naked flesh, Gen. Lee then ordered the overseer to thoroughly wash our backs with brine, which was done."[44][49]

The Norris men were then sent by Lee's agent to work on the railroads in Virginia and Alabama. According to the interview, Norris was sent to Richmond in January 1863 "from which place I finally made my escape through the rebel lines to freedom." But Federal authorities reported that Norris came within their lines on September 5, 1863, and that he "left Richmond ... with a pass from General Custis Lee."[50][51] Lee freed the Custis slaves, including Wesley Norris, after the end of the five-year period in the winter of 1862, filing the deed of manumission on December 29, 1862.[52][53]

Biographers of Lee have differed over the credibility of the account of the punishment as described in the letters in the Tribune and in Norris's personal account. They broadly agree that Lee had a group of escaped slaves recaptured, and that after recapturing them he hired them out off of the Arlington plantation as a punishment; but they disagree over the likelihood that Lee flogged them, and over the charge that he personally whipped Mary Norris. In 1934, Douglas S. Freeman described them as "Lee's first experience with the extravagance of irresponsible antislavery agitators" and asserted that "There is no evidence, direct or indirect, that Lee ever had them or any other Negroes flogged. The usage at Arlington and elsewhere in Virginia among people of Lee's station forbade such a thing."[54]

In 2000, Michael Fellman, in The Making of Robert E. Lee, found the claims that Lee had personally whipped Mary Norris "extremely unlikely," but found it not at all unlikely that Lee had ordered the runaways whipped: "corporal punishment (for which Lee substituted the euphemism 'firmness') was (believed to be) an intrinsic and necessary part of slave discipline. Although it was supposed to be applied only in a calm and rational manner, overtly physical domination of slaves, unchecked by law, was always brutal and potentially savage."[55]

In 2003, Bernice-Marie Yates's The Perfect Gentleman, cited Freeman's denial and followed his account in holding that, because of Lee's family connections to George Washington, he "was a prime target for abolitionists who lacked all the facts of the situation."[56]

Lee biographer Elizabeth Brown Pryor concluded in 2008 that "the facts are verifiable," based on "the consistency of the five extant descriptions of the episode (the only element that is not repeatedly corroborated is the allegation that Lee gave the beatings himself), as well as the existence of an account book that indicates the constable received compensation from Lee on the date that this event occurred."[57][58]

In 2014, Michael Korda wrote that "Although these letters are dismissed by most of Lee's biographers as exaggerated, or simply as unfounded abolitionist propaganda, it is hard to ignore them. ... It seems incongruously out of character for Lee to have whipped a slave woman himself, particularly one stripped to the waist, and that charge may have been a flourish added by the two correspondents; it was not repeated by Wesley Norris when his account of the incident was published in 1866. ... [A]lthough it seems unlikely that he would have done any of the whipping himself, he may not have flinched from observing it to make sure his orders were carried out exactly."[59]

Lee's views on race and slavery

Several historians have noted the paradoxical nature of Lee's beliefs and actions concerning race and slavery. While Lee protested he had sympathetic feelings for blacks, they were subordinate to his own racial identity.[60] While Lee held slavery to be an evil institution, he also saw some benefit to blacks held in slavery.[61] While Lee helped assist individual slaves to freedom in Liberia, and provided for their emancipation in his own will,[62] he believed the enslaved should be eventually freed in a general way only at some unspecified future date as a part of God's purpose.[60][63] Slavery for Lee was a moral and religious issue, and not one that would yield to political solutions.[64] Emancipation would sooner come from Christian impulse among slave masters before "storms and tempests of fiery controversy" such as was occurring in "Bleeding Kansas".[60] Countering Southerners who argued for slavery as a positive good, Lee in his well-known analysis of slavery from an 1856 letter (see below) called it a moral and political evil. While both Robert and his wife Mary Lee were disgusted with slavery, they also defended it against abolitionist demands for immediate emancipation for all enslaved.[65]

Lee argued that slavery was bad for white people but good for black people,[66] claiming that he found slavery bothersome and time-consuming as an everyday institution to run. In an 1856 letter to his wife, he maintained that slavery was a great evil, but primarily due to adverse impact that it had on white people:[67]

In this enlightened age, there are few I believe, but what will acknowledge, that slavery as an institution, is a moral & political evil in any Country. It is useless to expatiate on its disadvantages. I think it however a greater evil to the white man than to the black race, & while my feelings are strongly enlisted in behalf of the latter, my sympathies are more strong for the former. The blacks are immeasurably better off here than in Africa, morally, socially & physically. The painful discipline they are undergoing, is necessary for their instruction as a race, & I hope will prepare & lead them to better things. How long their subjugation may be necessary is known & ordered by a wise Merciful Providence.[68]

Lee's father-in-law G. W. Parke Custis freed his slaves in his will.[69] In the same tradition, before leaving to serve in Mexico, Lee had written a will providing for the manumission of the only slaves he owned.[70] Parke Custis was a member of the American Colonization Society, which was formed to gradually end slavery by establishing a free republic in Liberia for African-Americans, and Lee assisted several ex-slaves to emigrate there. Also, according to historian Richard B. McCaslin, Lee was a gradual emancipationist, denouncing extremist proposals for immediate abolition of slavery. Lee rejected what he called evilly motivated political passion, fearing a civil and servile war from precipitous emancipation.[71]

Historian Elizabeth Brown Pryor offered an alternative interpretation of Lee's voluntary manumission of slaves in his will, and assisting slaves to a life of freedom in Liberia, seeing Lee as conforming to a "primacy of slave law". She wrote that Lee's private views on race and slavery,

"which today seem startling, were entirely unremarkable in Lee's world. No visionary, Lee nearly always tried to conform to accepted opinions. His assessment of black inferiority, of the necessity of racial stratification, the primacy of slave law, and even a divine sanction for it all, was in keeping with the prevailing views of other moderate slaveholders and a good many prominent Northerners."[72]

On taking on the role of administrator for the Parke Custis will, Lee used a provision to retain them in slavery to produce income for the estate to retire debt.[69] Lee did not welcome the role of planter while administering the Custis properties at Romancoke, another nearby the Pamunkey River and Arlington; he rented the estate's mill. While all the estates prospered under his administration, Lee was unhappy at direct participation in slavery as a hated institution.[70]

Even before what Michael Fellman called a "sorry involvement in actual slave management", Lee judged the experience of white mastery to be a greater moral evil to the white man than blacks suffering under the "painful discipline" of slavery which introduced Christianity, literacy and a work ethic to the "heathen African".[73] Columbia University historian Eric Foner notes that:

Lee "was not a pro-slavery ideologue. But I think equally important is that, unlike some white southerners, he never spoke out against slavery"[74]

By the time of Lee's career in the U.S. Army, the officers of West Point stood aloof from political-party and sectional strife on such issues as slavery, as a matter of principle, and Lee adhered to the principle.[75][76] He considered it his patriotic duty to be apolitical while in active Army service,[77][78][79] and Lee did not speak out publicly on the subject of slavery prior to the Civil War.[80][81] Before the outbreak of the War, in 1860, Lee voted for John C. Breckinridge, who was the extreme pro-slavery candidate in the 1860 presidential election, not John Bell, the more moderate Southerner who won Virginia.[82]

Lee himself owned a small number of slaves in his lifetime and considered himself a paternalistic master.[82] There are various historical and newspaper hearsay accounts of Lee personally whipping a slave, but they are not direct eyewitness accounts. He was definitely involved in administering the day-to-day operations of a plantation and was involved in the recapture of runaway slaves.[83] One historian noted that Lee separated slave families, something that prominent slave-holding families in Virginia such as Washington and Custis did not do.[66] In 1862, Lee freed the slaves that his wife inherited, but that was in accordance with his father-in-law's will.[84]

Foner writes that "Lee's code of gentlemanly conduct did not seem to apply to blacks" during the War, as he did not stop his soldiers from kidnapping free black farmers and selling them into slavery.[74] Princeton University historian James M. McPherson noted that Lee initially rejected a prisoner exchange between the Confederacy and the Union when the Union demanded that black Union soldiers be included.[66] Lee did not accept the swap until a few months before the Confederacy's surrender.[66]

After the War, Lee told a congressional committee that blacks were "not disposed to work" and did not possess the intellectual capacity to vote and participate in politics.[84] Lee also said to the committee that he hoped that Virginia could "get rid of them," referring to blacks.[84] While not politically active, Lee defended Lincoln's successor Andrew Johnson's approach to Reconstruction, which according to Foner, "abandoned the former slaves to the mercy of governments controlled by their former owners."[85] According to Foner, "A word from Lee might have encouraged white Southerners to accord blacks equal rights and inhibited the violence against the freed people that swept the region during Reconstruction, but he chose to remain silent."[84] Lee was also urged to condemn the white-supremacy[86] organization Ku Klux Klan, but opted to remain silent.[82]

In the generation following the war, Lee, though he died just a few years later, became a central figure in the Lost Cause interpretation of the war. The argument that Lee had always somehow opposed slavery, and freed his wife's slaves, helped maintain his stature as a symbol of Southern honor and national reconciliation.[82] Douglas Southall Freeman's Pulitzer prize-winning four-volume R. E. Lee: A Biography (1936), which was for a long period considered the definitive work on Lee, downplayed his involvement in slavery and emphasized Lee as a virtuous person. Eric Foner, who describes Freeman's volume as a "hagiography", notes that on the whole, Freeman "displayed little interest in Lee's relationship to slavery. The index to his four volumes contained 22 entries for 'devotion to duty', 19 for 'kindness', 53 for Lee's celebrated horse, Traveller. But 'slavery', 'slave emancipation' and 'slave insurrection' together received five. Freeman observed, without offering details, that slavery in Virginia represented the system 'at its best'. He ignored the postwar testimony of Lee's former slave Wesley Norris about the brutal treatment to which he had been subjected."[82]

Harpers Ferry and return to Texas, 1859–1861

Both Harpers Ferry and the secession of Texas were monumental events leading up to the Civil War. Robert E. Lee was at both events. Lee initially remained loyal to the Union after Texas seceded.

Harpers Ferry

John Brown led a band of 21 abolitionists who seized the federal arsenal at Harpers Ferry, Virginia, in October 1859, hoping to incite a slave rebellion. President James Buchanan gave Lee command of detachments of militia, soldiers, and United States Marines, to suppress the uprising and arrest its leaders.[87] By the time Lee arrived that night, the militia on the site had surrounded Brown and his hostages. At dawn, Brown refused the demand for surrender. Lee attacked, and Brown and his followers were captured after three minutes of fighting. Lee's summary report of the episode shows Lee believed it "was the attempt of a fanatic or madman". Lee said Brown achieved "temporary success" by creating panic and confusion and by "magnifying" the number of participants involved in the raid.[88]

Texas

In 1860, Lt. Col. Robert E. Lee relieved Major Heintzelman at Fort Brown, and the Mexican authorities offered to restrain "their citizens from making predatory descents upon the territory and people of Texas ... this was the last active operation of the Cortina War". Rip Ford, a Texas Ranger at the time, described Lee as "dignified without hauteur, grand without pride ... he evinced an imperturbable self-possession, and a complete control of his passions ... possessing the capacity to accomplish great ends and the gift of controlling and leading men."[89]

When Texas seceded from the Union in February 1861, General David E. Twiggs surrendered all the American forces (about 4,000 men, including Lee, and commander of the Department of Texas) to the Texans. Twiggs immediately resigned from the U.S. Army and was made a Confederate general. Lee went back to Washington and was appointed Colonel of the First Regiment of Cavalry in March 1861. Lee's colonelcy was signed by the new president, Abraham Lincoln. Three weeks after his promotion, Colonel Lee was offered a senior command (with the rank of Major General) in the expanding Army to fight the Southern States that had left the Union. Fort Mason, Texas was Lee's last command with the United States Army.[90]

Civil War

Resignation from United States Army

Unlike many Southerners who expected a glorious war, Lee correctly predicted it as protracted and devastating.[91] He privately opposed the new Confederate States of America in letters in early 1861, denouncing secession as "nothing but revolution" and an unconstitutional betrayal of the efforts of the Founding Fathers. Writing to George Washington Custis in January, Lee stated:

The South, in my opinion, has been aggrieved by the acts of the North, as you say. I feel the aggression, and am willing to take every proper step for redress. It is the principle I contend for, not individual or private benefit. As an American citizen, I take great pride in my country, her prosperity and institutions, and would defend any State if her rights were invaded. But I can anticipate no greater calamity for the country than a dissolution of the Union. It would be an accumulation of all the evils we complain of, and I am willing to sacrifice everything but honor for its preservation. I hope, therefore, that all constitutional means will be exhausted before there is a resort to force. Secession is nothing but revolution. The framers of our Constitution never exhausted so much labor, wisdom, and forbearance in its formation, and surrounded it with so many guards and securities, if it was intended to be broken by every member of the Confederacy at will. It was intended for "perpetual union," so expressed in the preamble, and for the establishment of a government, not a compact, which can only be dissolved by revolution, or the consent of all the people in convention assembled.[92]

Lee in uniform, 1863

Despite opposing secession, Lee said in January that "we can with a clear conscience separate" if all peaceful means failed. He agreed with secessionists in most areas, rejecting the Northern abolitionists' criticisms and their prevention the expansion of slavery to the new western territories, and fear of its[which?] larger population. Lee supported the Crittenden Compromise, which would have constitutionally protected slavery.[93]

Lee's objection to secession was ultimately outweighed by a sense of personal honor, reservations about the legitimacy of a strife-ridden "Union that can only be maintained by swords and bayonets", and his duty to defend his native Virginia if attacked.[92] He was asked while leaving Texas by a lieutenant if he intended to fight for the Confederacy or the Union, to which Lee replied, "I shall never bear arms against the Union, but it may be necessary for me to carry a musket in the defense of my native state, Virginia, in which case I shall not prove recreant to my duty".[94][93]

Although Virginia had the most slaves of any state, it was more similar to Maryland, which stayed in the Union, than to the Deep South; a convention voted against secession in early 1861. Scott, commanding general of the Union Army and Lee's mentor, told Lincoln he wanted him for a top command, telling Secretary of War Simon Cameron that he had "entire confidence" in Lee. He accepted a promotion to colonel of the 1st Cavalry Regiment on March 28, again swearing an oath to the United States.[95][93] Meanwhile, Lee ignored an offer of command from the Confederacy. After Lincoln's call for troops to put down the rebellion, a second Virginia convention in Richmond voted to secede[96] on April 17, and a May 23 referendum would likely ratify the decision. That night Lee dined with brother Smith and cousin Phillips, naval officers. Because of Lee's indecision, Phillips went to the War Department the next morning to warn that the Union might lose his cousin if the government did not act quickly.[93]

In Washington that day,[91] Lee was offered by presidential advisor Francis P. Blair a role as major general to command the defense of the national capital. He replied:

Mr. Blair, I look upon secession as anarchy. If I owned the four millions of slaves in the South I would sacrifice them all to the Union; but how can I draw my sword upon Virginia, my native state?[96]

Lee immediately went to Scott, who tried to persuade him that Union forces would be large enough to prevent the South from fighting, so he would not have to oppose his state; Lee disagreed. When Lee asked if he could go home and not fight, the fellow Virginian said that the army did not need equivocal soldiers and that if he wanted to resign, he should do so before receiving official orders. Scott told him that Lee had made "the greatest mistake of your life".[93]

Lee agreed that to avoid dishonor he had to resign before receiving unwanted orders. While historians have usually called his decision inevitable ("the answer he was born to make", wrote Douglas Southall Freeman; another called it a "no-brainer") given the ties to family and state, an 1871 letter from his eldest daughter, Mary Custis Lee, to a biographer described Lee as "worn and harassed" yet calm as he deliberated alone in his office. People on the street noticed Lee's grim face as he tried to decide over the next two days, and he later said that he kept the resignation letter for a day before sending it on April 20. Two days later the Richmond convention invited Lee to the city. It elected him as commander of Virginia state forces before his arrival on April 23, and almost immediately gave him George Washington's sword as symbol of his appointment; whether he was told of a decision he did not want without time to decide, or did want the excitement and opportunity of command, is unclear.[12][93][91]

A cousin on Scott's staff told the family that Lee's decision so upset Scott that he collapsed on a sofa and mourned as if he had lost a son, and asked to not hear Lee's name. When Lee told family his decision he said "I suppose you will all think I have done very wrong", as the others were mostly pro-Union; only Mary Custis was a secessionist, and her mother especially wanted to choose the Union but told her husband that she would support whatever he decided. Many younger men like nephew Fitzhugh wanted to support the Confederacy, but Lee's three sons joined the Confederate military only after their father's decision.[93][91]

Most family members,like brother Smith, also reluctantly chose the South, but Smith's wife and Anne, Lee's sister, still supported the Union; Anne's son joined the Union Army, and no one in his family ever spoke to Lee again. Many cousins fought for the Confederacy, but Phillips and John Fitzgerald told Lee in person that they would uphold their oaths; John H. Upshur stayed with the Union military despite much family pressure; Roger Jones stayed in the Union army after Lee refused to advise him on what to do; and two of Philip Fendall's sons fought for the Union. Forty percent of Virginian officers stayed with the North.[93][91]

Early role

At the outbreak of war, Lee was appointed to command all of Virginia's forces, but upon the formation of the Confederate States Army, he was named one of its first five full generals. Lee did not wear the insignia of a Confederate general, but only the three stars of a Confederate colonel, equivalent to his last U.S. Army rank.[97] He did not intend to wear a general's insignia until the Civil War had been won and he could be promoted, in peacetime, to general in the Confederate Army.

Lee's first field assignment was commanding Confederate forces in western Virginia, where he was defeated at the Battle of Cheat Mountain and was widely blamed for Confederate setbacks.[98] He was then sent to organize the coastal defenses along the Carolina and Georgia seaboard, appointed commander, "Department of South Carolina, Georgia and Florida" on November 5, 1861. Between then and the fall of Fort Pulaski, April 11, 1862, he put in place a defense of Savannah that proved successful in blocking Federal advance on Savannah. Confederate fort and naval gunnery dictated night time movement and construction by the besiegers. Federal preparations required four months. In those four months, Lee developed a defense in depth. Behind Fort Pulaski on the Savannah River, Fort Jackson was improved, and two additional batteries covered river approaches.[99] In the face of the Union superiority in naval, artillery and infantry deployment, Lee was able to block any Federal advance on Savannah, and at the same time, well-trained Georgia troops were released in time to meet McClellan's Peninsula Campaign. The city of Savannah would not fall until Sherman's approach from the interior at the end of 1864.

At first, the press spoke to the disappointment of losing Fort Pulaski. Surprised by the effectiveness of large caliber Parrott Rifles in their first deployment, it was widely speculated that only betrayal could have brought overnight surrender to a Third System Fort. Lee was said to have failed to get effective support in the Savannah River from the three sidewheeler gunboats of the Georgia Navy. Although again blamed by the press for Confederate reverses, he was appointed military adviser to Confederate President Jefferson Davis, the former U.S. Secretary of War. While in Richmond, Lee was ridiculed as the 'King of Spades' for his excessive digging of trenches around the capitol. These trenches would later play a pivotal role in battles near the end of the war.[100]

Commander, Army of Northern Virginia (June 1862 – June 1863)

In the spring of 1862, in the Peninsula Campaign, the Union Army of the Potomac under General George B. McClellan advanced on Richmond from Fort Monroe to the east. McClellan forced Gen. Joseph E. Johnston and the Army of Virginia to retreat to just north and east of the Confederate capital.

Then Johnston was wounded at the Battle of Seven Pines, on June 1, 1862. Lee now got his first opportunity to lead an army in the field – the force he renamed the Army of Northern Virginia, signalling his confidence that the Union army would be driven away from Richmond. Early in the war, Lee had been called "Granny Lee" for his allegedly timid style of command.[101] Confederate newspaper editorials objected to him replacing Johnston, opining that Lee would be passive, waiting for Union attack. And for the first three weeks of June, he did not attack, instead strengthening Richmond's defenses.

Lee mounted on Traveller (September 1866)

But then he launched a series of bold attacks against McClellan's forces, the Seven Days Battles. Despite superior Union numbers, and some clumsy tactical performances by his subordinates, Lee's attacks derailed McClellan's plans and drove back part of his forces. Confederate casualties were heavy, but McClellan was unnerved, retreated 25 miles (40 km) to the lower James River, and abandoned the Peninsula Campaign. This success completely changed Confederate morale, and the public's regard for Lee. After the Seven Days Battles, and until the end of the war, his men called him simply "Marse Robert", a term of respect and affection.

The setback, and the resulting drop in Union morale, impelled Lincoln to adopt a new policy of relentless, committed warfare.[102][103] After the Seven Days, Lincoln decided he would move to emancipate most Confederate slaves by executive order, as a military act, using his authority as commander-in-chief.[104] But he needed a Union victory first.

Meanwhile, Lee defeated another Union army under Gen. John Pope at the Second Battle of Bull Run. In less than 90 days after taking command, Lee had run McClellan off the Peninsula, defeated Pope, and moved the battle lines 82 miles (132 km) north, from just outside Richmond to 20 miles (32 km) south of Washington.

Lee now invaded Maryland and Pennsylvania, hoping to collect supplies in Union territory, and possibly win a victory that would sway the upcoming Union elections in favor of ending the war. But McClellan's men found a lost Confederate dispatch, Special Order 191, that revealed Lee's plans and movements. McClellan always exaggerated Lee's numerical strength, but now he knew the Confederate army was divided and could be destroyed in detail. However, McClellan moved slowly, not realizing a spy had informed Lee that McClellan had the plans. Lee quickly concentrated his forces west of Antietam Creek, near Sharpsburg, Maryland, where McClellan attacked on September 17. The Battle of Antietam was the single bloodiest day of the war, with both sides suffering enormous losses. Lee's army barely withstood the Union assaults, then retreated to Virginia the next day. This narrow Confederate defeat gave President Abraham Lincoln the opportunity to issue his Emancipation Proclamation,[105] which put the Confederacy on the diplomatic and moral defensive.[106]

Disappointed by McClellan's failure to destroy Lee's army, Lincoln named Ambrose Burnside as commander of the Army of the Potomac. Burnside ordered an attack across the Rappahannock River at Fredericksburg, Virginia. Delays in bridging the river allowed Lee's army ample time to organize strong defenses, and the Union frontal assault on December 13, 1862, was a disaster. There were 12,600 Union casualties to 5,000 Confederate; one of the most one-sided battles in the Civil War.[107] After this victory, Lee reportedly said "It is well that war is so terrible, else we should grow too fond of it."[107] At Fredericksburg, according to historian Michael Fellman, Lee had completely entered into the "spirit of war, where destructiveness took on its own beauty."[107]

After the bitter Union defeat at Fredericksburg, President Lincoln named Joseph Hooker commander of the Army of the Potomac. In May 1863, Hooker maneuvered to attack Lee's army via Chancellorsville, Virginia. But Hooker was defeated by Lee's daring maneuver: dividing his army and sending Stonewall Jackson's corps to attack Hooker's flank. Lee won a decisive victory over a larger force, but with heavy casualties, including Jackson, his finest corps commander, who was accidentally killed by his own troops.[108]

Battle of Gettysburg

The critical decisions came in May–June 1863, after Lee's smashing victory at the Battle of Chancellorsville. The western front was crumbling, as multiple uncoordinated Confederate armies were unable to handle General Ulysses S. Grant's campaign against Vicksburg. The top military advisers wanted to save Vicksburg, but Lee persuaded Davis to overrule them and authorize yet another invasion of the North. The immediate goal was to acquire urgently needed supplies from the rich farming districts of Pennsylvania; a long-term goal was to stimulate peace activity in the North by demonstrating the power of the South to invade. Lee's decision proved a significant strategic blunder and cost the Confederacy control of its western regions, and nearly cost Lee his own army as Union forces cut him off from the South.[109]

Battle of Gettysburg, by Thure de Thulstrup

In the summer of 1863, Lee invaded the North again, marching through western Maryland and into south central Pennsylvania. He encountered Union forces under George G. Meade at the three-day Battle of Gettysburg in Pennsylvania in July; the battle would produce the largest number of casualties in the American Civil War. With some of his subordinates being new and inexperienced in their commands, J.E.B. Stuart's cavalry being out of the area, and Lee being slightly ill, he was less than comfortable with how events were unfolding. While the first day of battle was controlled by the Confederates, key terrain that should have been taken by General Ewell was not. The second day ended with the Confederates unable to break the Union position, and the Union being more solidified. Lee's decision on the third day, against the judgment of his best corps commander General Longstreet, to launch a massive frontal assault on the center of the Union line turned out to be disastrous. The assault known as Pickett's Charge was repulsed and resulted in heavy Confederate losses. The general rode out to meet his retreating army and proclaimed, "All this has been my fault."[110] Lee was compelled to retreat. Despite flooded rivers that blocked his retreat, he escaped Meade's ineffective pursuit. Following his defeat at Gettysburg, Lee sent a letter of resignation to President Davis on August 8, 1863, but Davis refused Lee's request. That fall, Lee and Meade met again in two minor campaigns that did little to change the strategic standoff. The Confederate Army never fully recovered from the substantial losses incurred during the three-day battle in southern Pennsylvania. The historian Shelby Foote stated, "Gettysburg was the price the South paid for having Robert E. Lee as commander."

Ulysses S. Grant and the Union offensive

In 1864 the new Union general-in-chief, Lt. Gen. Ulysses S. Grant, sought to use his large advantages in manpower and material resources to destroy Lee's army by attrition, pinning Lee against his capital of Richmond. Lee successfully stopped each attack, but Grant with his superior numbers kept pushing each time a bit farther to the southeast. These battles in the Overland Campaign included the Wilderness, Spotsylvania Court House and Cold Harbor.

Grant eventually was able to stealthily move his army across the James River. After stopping a Union attempt to capture Petersburg, Virginia, a vital railroad link supplying Richmond, Lee's men built elaborate trenches and were besieged in Petersburg, a development which presaged the trench warfare of World War I. Lee attempted to break the stalemate by sending Jubal A. Early on a raid through the Shenandoah Valley to Washington, D.C., but Early was defeated early on by the superior forces of Philip Sheridan. The Siege of Petersburg lasted from June 1864 until March 1865, with Lee's outnumbered and poorly supplied army shrinking daily because of desertions by disheartened Confederates.

General in Chief

Lee with son Custis (left) and aide Walter H. Taylor (right) by Brady, April 16, 1865

On February 6, 1865, Lee was appointed General in Chief of the Armies of the Confederate States.

As the South ran out of manpower the issue of arming the slaves became paramount. Lee explained, "We should employ them without delay ... [along with] gradual and general emancipation". The first units were in training as the war ended.[111][112] As the Confederate army was devastated by casualties, disease and desertion, the Union attack on Petersburg succeeded on April 2, 1865. Lee abandoned Richmond and retreated west. Lee then made an attempt to escape to the southwest and join up with Joseph E. Johnston's Army of Tennessee in North Carolina. However, his forces were soon surrounded and he surrendered them to Grant on April 9, 1865, at the Battle of Appomattox Court House.[113] Other Confederate armies followed suit and the war ended. The day after his surrender, Lee issued his Farewell Address to his army.

Lee resisted calls by some officers to reject surrender and allow small units to melt away into the mountains, setting up a lengthy guerrilla war. He insisted the war was over and energetically campaigned for inter-sectional reconciliation. "So far from engaging in a war to perpetuate slavery, I am rejoiced that slavery is abolished. I believe it will be greatly for the interests of the South."[114]

Summaries of Lee's Civil War battles

The following are summaries of Civil War campaigns and major battles where Robert E. Lee was the commanding officer:[115]

Battle Date Result Opponent Confederate troop strength Union troop strength Confederate casualties Union casualties Notes

Cheat Mountain September 11–13, 1861 Defeat Reynolds 5,000 3,000 ~90 88 Lee's first battle of the Civil War. Severely criticized, Lee was nicknamed "Granny Lee". Lee was sent to SC and GA to supervise fortifications.[116]

Seven Days June 25 – July 1, 1862 Victory

Oak Grove: Stalemate (Union withdrawal)

Beaver Dam Creek: Union victory

Gaine's Mill: Confederate victory

Savage's Station: Stalemate

Glendale: Stalemate (Union withdrawal)

Malvern Hill: Union victory

McClellan 95,000 91,000 20,614 15,849 Lee acquitted himself well, and remained in field command for the duration of the war under the direction of Jefferson Davis. Union troops remained on the Lower Peninsula and at Fortress Monroe, which became a terminus on the Underground Railroad, and the site terming escaped slaves as "contribands", no longer returned to their rebel owners.

Second Manassas August 28–30, 1862 Victory Pope 49,000 76,000 9,197 16,054 Union forces continued to occupy northern Virginia

South Mountain September 14, 1862 Defeat McClellan 18,000 28,000 2,685 1,813 Confederates lost control of westernmost Virginian congressional districts which would later be the core counties of West Virginia.

Antietam September 16–18, 1862 Stalemate McClellan 52,000 75,000 13,724 12,410 Tactical stalemate but strategic Union victory. The Confederates lost an opportunity to gain foreign recognition, Lincoln moved forward on his preliminary Emancipation Proclamation.

Fredericksburg December 11, 1862 Victory Burnside 72,000 114,000 5,309 12,653 With Lee's troops and supplies depleted, Confederates remained in place south of the Rappahannock. Union forces did not withdraw from northern Virginia.

Chancellorsville May 1, 1863 Victory Hooker 57,000 105,000 12,764 16,792 Union forces withdrew to ring of defenses around Washington, DC.

Gettysburg July 1, 1863 Defeat Meade 75,000 83,000 23,231

–28,063 23,049 The Confederate army was physically and spiritually exhausted. Meade was criticized for not immediately pursuing Lee's army. This battle become known as the High Water Mark of the Confederacy.[117] Lee would never personally invade the North again after this battle. Rather he was determined to defend Richmond and eventually Petersburg at all costs.

Wilderness May 5, 1864 Inconclusive Grant 61,000 102,000 11,400 18,400 Lee's tactical victory, yet Grant continued his offensive, circling east and south advancing on Richmond and Petersburg

Spotsylvania May 12, 1864 Inconclusive[118] Grant 52,000 100,000 12,000 18,000 Although beaten and unable to take Lee's defenses, Grant continued the Union offensive, circling east and south advancing on Richmond and Petersburg

North Anna May 23–26, 1864 Inconclusive Grant 50,000–53,000 67,000–100,000 1,552 3,986 North Anna had proved to be a relatively minor affair when compared to other Civil War battles.

Totopotomoy Creek May 28–30, 1864 Inconclusive Grant N/A N/A 1,593 731 As Grant continued his attempts to maneuver around Lee's right flank and lure him into a general battle in the open.

Cold Harbor June 1, 1864 Inconclusive Grant 62,000 108,000 5,287 12,000 Although Grant was able to continue his offensive, Grant referred to the Cold Harbor assault as his "greatest regret" of the war in his memoirs.

Fussell's Mill August 14, 1864 Victory Hancock 20,000 28,000 1,700 2,901 Union attempt to break Confederate siege lines at Richmond, the Confederate capital

Appomattox Campaign March 29, 1865 Defeat Grant 50,000 113,000 N/A General Lee surrenders 10,780 General Robert E. Lee surrendered to General Ulysses S. Grant.[119] After the surrender Grant gave Lee's army much-needed food rations; they were paroled to return to their homes, never again to take up arms against the Union.

Postbellum life

Lee in 1869 (photo by Levin C. Handy)

External video

video icon Booknotes interview with Emory Thomas on Robert E. Lee: A Biography, September 10, 1995, C-SPAN

After the war, Lee was not arrested or punished (although he was indicted [120]), but he did lose the right to vote as well as some property. Lee's prewar family home, the Custis-Lee Mansion, was seized by Union forces during the war and turned into Arlington National Cemetery, and his family was not compensated until more than a decade after his death.[121]

In 1866 Lee counseled southerners not to resume fighting, of which Grant said Lee was "setting an example of forced acquiescence so grudging and pernicious in its effects as to be hardly realized".[122] Lee joined with Democrats in opposing the Radical Republicans who demanded punitive measures against the South, distrusted its commitment to the abolition of slavery and, indeed, distrusted the region's loyalty to the United States.[123][124] Lee supported a system of free public schools for blacks, but forthrightly opposed allowing blacks to vote. "My own opinion is that, at this time, they [black Southerners] cannot vote intelligently, and that giving them the [vote] would lead to a great deal of demagogism, and lead to embarrassments in various ways," Lee stated.[125] Emory Thomas says Lee had become a suffering Christ-like icon for ex-Confederates. President Grant invited him to the White House in 1869, and he went. Nationally he became an icon of reconciliation between the North and South, and the reintegration of former Confederates into the national fabric.[126]

General Lee and his Confederate officers in their first meeting since Appomattox, August 1869.

Lee hoped to retire to a farm of his own, but he was too much a regional symbol to live in obscurity. From April to June 1865, he and his family resided in Richmond at the Stewart-Lee House.[127] He accepted an offer to serve as the president of Washington College (now Washington and Lee University) in Lexington, Virginia, and served from October 1865 until his death. The Trustees used his famous name in large-scale fund-raising appeals and Lee transformed Washington College into a leading Southern college, expanding its offerings significantly, adding programs in commerce and journalism, and incorporating the Lexington Law School. Lee was well liked by the students, which enabled him to announce an "honor system" like that of West Point, explaining that "we have but one rule here, and it is that every student be a gentleman." To speed up national reconciliation Lee recruited students from the North and made certain they were well treated on campus and in town.[128]

Several glowing appraisals of Lee's tenure as college president have survived, depicting the dignity and respect he commanded among all. Previously, most students had been obliged to occupy the campus dormitories, while only the most mature were allowed to live off-campus. Lee quickly reversed this rule, requiring most students to board off-campus, and allowing only the most mature to live in the dorms as a mark of privilege; the results of this policy were considered a success. A typical account by a professor there states that "the students fairly worshipped him, and deeply dreaded his displeasure; yet so kind, affable, and gentle was he toward them that all loved to approach him. ... No student would have dared to violate General Lee's expressed wish or appeal."[129]

While at Washington College, Lee told a colleague that the greatest mistake of his life was taking a military education.[130]

During his time as president of Washington College, he defended his father in a biographical sketch.[131]

President Johnson's amnesty pardons

Oath of amnesty submitted by Robert E. Lee in 1865

On May 29, 1865, President Andrew Johnson issued a Proclamation of Amnesty and Pardon to persons who had participated in the rebellion against the United States. There were fourteen excepted classes, though, and members of those classes had to make special application to the President. Lee sent an application to Grant and wrote to President Johnson on June 13, 1865:

Being excluded from the provisions of amnesty & pardon contained in the proclamation of the 29th Ulto; I hereby apply for the benefits, & full restoration of all rights & privileges extended to those included in its terms. I graduated at the Mil. Academy at West Point in June 1829. Resigned from the U.S. Army April '61. Was a General in the Confederate Army, & included in the surrender of the Army of N. Virginia 9 April '65.[132]

On October 2, 1865, the same day that Lee was inaugurated as president of Washington College in Lexington, Virginia, he signed his Amnesty Oath, thereby complying fully with the provision of Johnson's proclamation. Lee was not pardoned, nor was his citizenship restored.[132]

Three years later, on December 25, 1868, Johnson proclaimed a second amnesty which removed previous exceptions, such as the one that affected Lee.[133]

Postwar politics

Lee, who had opposed secession and remained mostly indifferent to politics before the Civil War, supported President Andrew Johnson's plan of Presidential Reconstruction that took effect in 1865–66. However, he opposed the Congressional Republican program that took effect in 1867. In February 1866, he was called to testify before the Joint Congressional Committee on Reconstruction in Washington, where he expressed support for Johnson's plans for quick restoration of the former Confederate states, and argued that restoration should return, as far as possible, to the status quo ante in the Southern states' governments (with the exception of slavery).[134]

Robert E. Lee, oil on canvas, Edward Calledon Bruce, 1865. Virginia Historical Society

Lee told the committee that "every one with whom I associate expresses kind feelings towards the freedmen. They wish to see them get on in the world, and particularly to take up some occupation for a living, and to turn their hands to some work." Lee also expressed his "willingness that blacks should be educated, and ... that it would be better for the blacks and for the whites." Lee forthrightly opposed allowing blacks to vote: "My own opinion is that, at this time, they [black Southerners] cannot vote intelligently, and that giving them the [vote] would lead to a great deal of demagogism, and lead to embarrassments in various ways."[135][136]

In an interview in May 1866, Lee said: "The Radical party are likely to do a great deal of harm, for we wish now for good feeling to grow up between North and South, and the President, Mr. Johnson, has been doing much to strengthen the feeling in favor of the Union among us. The relations between the Negroes and the whites were friendly formerly, and would remain so if legislation be not passed in favor of the blacks, in a way that will only do them harm."[137]

In 1868, Lee's ally Alexander H. H. Stuart drafted a public letter of endorsement for the Democratic Party's presidential campaign, in which Horatio Seymour ran against Lee's old foe Republican Ulysses S. Grant. Lee signed it along with thirty-one other ex-Confederates. The Democratic campaign, eager to publicize the endorsement, published the statement widely in newspapers.[138] Their letter claimed paternalistic concern for the welfare of freed Southern blacks, stating that "The idea that the Southern people are hostile to the negroes and would oppress them, if it were in their power to do so, is entirely unfounded. They have grown up in our midst, and we have been accustomed from childhood to look upon them with kindness."[139] However, it also called for the restoration of white political rule, arguing that "It is true that the people of the South, in common with a large majority of the people of the North and West, are, for obvious reasons, inflexibly opposed to any system of laws that would place the political power of the country in the hands of the negro race. But this opposition springs from no feeling of enmity, but from a deep-seated conviction that, at present, the negroes have neither the intelligence nor the other qualifications which are necessary to make them safe depositories of political power."[140]

In his public statements and private correspondence, Lee argued that a tone of reconciliation and patience would further the interests of white Southerners better than hotheaded antagonism to federal authority or the use of violence. Lee repeatedly expelled white students from Washington College for violent attacks on local black men, and publicly urged obedience to the authorities and respect for law and order.[141] He privately chastised fellow ex-Confederates such as Jefferson Davis and Jubal Early for their frequent, angry responses to perceived Northern insults, writing in private to them as he had written to a magazine editor in 1865, that "It should be the object of all to avoid controversy, to allay passion, give full scope to reason and to every kindly feeling. By doing this and encouraging our citizens to engage in the duties of life with all their heart and mind, with a determination not to be turned aside by thoughts of the past and fears of the future, our country will not only be restored in material prosperity, but will be advanced in science, in virtue and in religion."[142]

Illness and death

Lee's death mask

"Recumbent Statue" of Robert E. Lee asleep on the battlefield, Lee Chapel, Lexington, Virginia.

On September 28, 1870, Lee suffered a stroke. He died two weeks later, shortly after 9 a.m. on October 12, 1870, in Lexington, Virginia, from the effects of pneumonia. According to one account, his last words on the day of his death, were "Tell Hill he must come up! Strike the tent",[143] but this is debatable because of conflicting accounts and because Lee's stroke had resulted in aphasia, possibly rendering him unable to speak.[144]

At first no suitable coffin for the body could be located. The muddy roads were too flooded for anyone to get in or out of the town of Lexington. An undertaker had ordered three from Richmond that had reached Lexington, but due to unprecedented flooding from long-continued heavy rains, the caskets were washed down the Maury River. Two neighborhood boys, C.G. Chittum and Robert E. Hillis, found one of the coffins that had been swept ashore. Undamaged, it was used for the General's body, though it was a bit short for him. As a result, Lee was buried without shoes.[145] He was buried underneath Lee Chapel at Washington and Lee University, where his body remains.

Robert Edward Lee in art at the Battle of Chancellorsville in a stained glass window of the Washington National Cathedral

Legacy

Among the supporters of the Confederacy, Lee came to be even more revered after his surrender than he had been during the war, when Stonewall Jackson had been the great Confederate hero. In an address before the Southern Historical Society in Atlanta, Georgia in 1874, Benjamin Harvey Hill described Lee in this way:

He was a foe without hate; a friend without treachery; a soldier without cruelty; a victor without oppression, and a victim without murmuring. He was a public officer without vices; a private citizen without wrong; a neighbour without reproach; a Christian without hypocrisy, and a man without guile. He was a Caesar, without his ambition; Frederick, without his tyranny; Napoleon, without his selfishness, and Washington, without his reward.[146]

By the end of the 19th century, Lee's popularity had spread to the North.[147] Lee's admirers have pointed to his character and devotion to duty, and his occasional tactical successes in battles against a stronger foe.

According to my notion of military history there is as much instruction both in strategy and in tactics to be gleaned from General Lee's operations of 1862 as there is to be found in Napoleon's campaigns of 1796.

— Field Marshal Garnet Wolseley[148]

Military historians continue to pay attention to his battlefield tactics and maneuvering, though many think he should have designed better strategic plans for the Confederacy. He was not given full direction of the Southern war effort until late in the conflict.

Historian Eric Foner writes that at the end of his life,

"Lee had become the embodiment of the Southern cause. A generation later, he was a national hero. The 1890s and early 20th century witnessed the consolidation of white supremacy in the post-Reconstruction South and widespread acceptance in the North of Southern racial attitudes."[149]

Robert E. Lee, Stonewall Jackson and Stratford Hall, Army Issue of 1936

Robert E. Lee, Stonewall Jackson and Stratford Hall, Army Issue of 1936

Robert E. Lee stamp, Liberty Issue of 1955

Robert E. Lee, Liberty Issue of 1955

Washington and Lee University Issue of 1948

Washington and Lee University Issue of 1948

R. E. Lee, Jefferson Davis, Stonewall Jackson. Stone Mountain Issue of 1970

Robert E. Lee, Jefferson Davis, Stonewall Jackson. Stone Mountain Issue of 1970

Robert E. Lee has been commemorated on U.S. postage stamps at least five times, the first one being a commemorative stamp that also honored Stonewall Jackson, issued in 1936. A second "regular-issue" stamp was issued in 1955. He was commemorated with a 32-cent stamp issued in the American Civil War Issue of June 29, 1995. His horse Traveller is pictured in the background.[150]

Washington and Lee University in Lexington, Virginia was commemorated on its 200th anniversary on November 23, 1948, with a 3-cent postage stamp. The central design is a view of the university, flanked by portraits of generals George Washington and Robert E. Lee.[151] Lee was again commemorated on a commemorative stamp in 1970, along with Jefferson Davis and Thomas J. "Stonewall" Jackson, depicted on horseback on the 6-cent Stone Mountain Memorial commemorative issue, modeled after the actual Stone Mountain Memorial carving in Georgia. The stamp was issued on September 19, 1970, in conjunction with the dedication of the Stone Mountain Confederate Memorial in Georgia on May 9, 1970. The design of the stamp replicates the memorial, the largest high relief sculpture in the world. It is carved on the side of Stone Mountain 400 feet above the ground.[152]

Stone Mountain also led to Lee's appearance on a commemorative coin, the 1925 Stone Mountain Memorial half dollar. During the 1920s and '30s dozens of specially designed half dollars were struck to raise money for various events and causes. This issue had a particularly wide distribution, with 1,314,709 minted. Unlike some of the other issues it remains a very common coin.

In 1865, after the war, Lee was paroled and signed an oath of allegiance, asking to have his citizenship of the United States restored. However, his application was not processed by Secretary of State William Seward, a radical Republican and firm opponent of slavery, and as a result Lee did not receive a pardon and his citizenship was not restored.[153][154] On January 30, 1975, Senate Joint Resolution 23, A joint resolution to restore posthumously full rights of citizenship to General R. E. Lee was introduced into the Senate by Senator Harry F. Byrd Jr. (I-VA), the result of a five-year campaign to accomplish this. Proponents portrayed the lack of pardon as a mere clerical error. The resolution, which enacted Public Law 94–67, was passed, and the bill was signed by President Gerald Ford on September 5.[155][156][157]

Monuments, memorials and commemorations

See also: List of memorials to Robert E. Lee

Arlington House

Jefferson Davis, Lee, and Stonewall Jackson at Stone Mountain

Lee opposed the construction of public memorials to Confederate rebellion on the grounds that they would prevent the healing of wounds inflicted during the war.[158] Nevertheless, after his death, he became an icon used by promoters of "Lost Cause" mythology, who sought to romanticize the Confederate cause and strengthen white supremacy in the South.[158] Later in the 20th century, particularly following the civil rights movement, historians reassessed Lee; his reputation fell based on his failure to support rights for freedmen after the war, and even his strategic choices as a military leader fell under scrutiny.[149][159]

From its installation in 1884 until its removal in 2017, the most prominent monument in New Orleans was a 60-foot (18 m)-tall monument to General Lee. A 16.5-foot (5.0 m) statue of Lee stood tall upon a towering column of white marble in the middle of Lee Circle. The statue of Lee, which weighs more than 7,000 pounds (3,200 kg) faced the north. Lee Circle is situated along New Orleans's famous St. Charles Avenue. The New Orleans streetcars roll past Lee Circle and New Orleans's best Mardi Gras parades go around Lee Circle (the spot is so popular that bleachers are set up annually around the perimeter for Mardi Gras). Around the corner from Lee Circle is New Orleans's Confederate museum, which contains the second-largest collection of Confederate memorabilia in the world.[160] The statue of General Lee was removed on May 19, 2017, the last of four Confederate monuments in New Orleans to be taken down.[161]

In a tribute to Lee Circle (which had formerly been known as Tivoli Circle), former Confederate soldier George Washington Cable wrote:

In Tivoli Circle, New Orleans, from the centre and apex of its green flowery mound, an immense column of pure white marble rises in the ... majesty of Grecian proportions high up above the city's house-tops into the dazzling sunshine ... On its dizzy top stands the bronze figure of one of the world's greatest captains. He is alone. Not one of his mighty lieutenants stand behind, beside or below him. His arms are folded on that breast that never knew fear, and his calm, dauntless gaze meets the morning sun as it rises, like the new prosperity of the land he loved and served so masterly, above the far distant battle fields where so many thousands of his gray veterans lie in the sleep of fallen heroes. (Silent South, 1885, The Century Illustrated Monthly Magazine)

Arlington House, The Robert E. Lee Memorial, also known as the Custis–Lee Mansion,[162] is a Greek revival mansion in Arlington, Virginia, that was once Lee's home. It overlooks the Potomac River and the National Mall in Washington, D.C. During the Civil War, the grounds of the mansion were selected as the site of Arlington National Cemetery, in part to ensure that Lee would never again be able to return to his home. The United States designated the mansion as a National Memorial to Lee in 1955, a mark of widespread respect for him in both the North and South.[163]

Unveiling of the Equestrian Statue of Robert E. Lee, May 29, 1890, Richmond, Virginia

In Richmond, Virginia, a large equestrian statue of Lee by French sculptor Jean Antonin Mercié is the centerpiece of Monument Avenue, which has four other statues of Confederates. This monument to Lee was unveiled on May 29, 1890; over 100,000 people attended this dedication. That has been described as "the day white Virginia stopped admiring Gen. Robert E. Lee and started worshiping him".[164] Lee is also shown mounted on Traveller in Gettysburg National Military Park on top of the Virginia Monument; he is facing roughly in the direction of Pickett's Charge. Lee's portrayal on a mural on Richmond's Flood Wall on the James River, considered offensive by some, was removed in the late 1990s, but currently is back on the flood wall.

Also in Virginia, the Robert Edward Lee (sculpture) at Charlottesville was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1997.[165] Since there is no historical link between Lee and the city of Charlottesville, the City Council of Charlottesville voted in February 2017 to remove it, along with a statue of Stonewall Jackson, but this was temporarily stayed by court action. They did rename Lee Park, Emancipation Park. The prospect of the statues being removed and the parks being renamed brought many out-of-towners, described as white supremacist and alt-right, to Charlottesville in the Unite the Right rally of August 2017, in which 3 people died. For several months the monuments were shrouded in black. As of October 2018, the fate of the statue of Lee is unresolved. The name of the park it is located in was changed again by the City Council, to Market Street Park, in July 2018.[166]

In Baltimore's Wyman Park, a large double equestrian statue of Lee and Jackson is located directly across from the Baltimore Museum of Art. Designed by Laura Gardin Fraser and dedicated in 1948, Lee is depicted astride his horse Traveller next to Stonewall Jackson who is mounted on "Little Sorrel." Architect John Russell Pope created the base, which was dedicated on the anniversary of the eve of the Battle of Chancellorsville.[167] The Baltimore area of Maryland is also home to a large nature park called Robert E. Lee Memorial Park.

Stained glass of Lee's life in the National Cathedral, depicting his time at West Point, service in the Corps of Engineers, the Battle of Chancellorsville, and his death

In 1953, two stained-glass windows – one honoring Lee, the other Stonewall Jackson – were installed in the Washington National Cathedral.[168] The stained glass of Lee shows him on horseback at Chancellorsville; it was sponsored by the United Daughters of the Confederacy.[169] In 2017, these windows were removed by a vote of the cathedral's governing board. The cathedral plans to keep the windows and eventually display them in historical context.[168]

An equestrian statue of Lee was installed in Robert E. Lee Park, in Dallas, until 2017; and in Austin, a statue of Lee is on display at the main mall of the University of Texas at Austin. A statue of Robert E. Lee is one of two statues (the other is Washington) representing Virginia in Statuary Hall in the Capitol in Washington, D.C. Lee is one of the figures depicted in bas-relief carved into Stone Mountain near Atlanta. Accompanying him on horseback in the relief are Stonewall Jackson and Jefferson Davis.[170]

The birthday of Robert E. Lee is celebrated or commemorated in several states. In Texas, he is celebrated as part of Confederate Heroes Day on January 19, Lee's birthday.[171] In Alabama and Mississippi, his birthday is celebrated on the same day as Martin Luther King, Jr. Day,[172][173] while in Georgia, this occurred on the day after Thanksgiving before 2016, when the state stopped officially recognizing the holiday.[174][175] In Virginia, Lee–Jackson Day was celebrated on the Friday preceding Martin Luther King, Jr. Day which is the third Monday in January,[176] until 2020, when the Virginia legislature eliminated the holiday, making Election Day a state holiday instead.[177]

Lee Chapel on the campus of Washington and Lee University

One United States college and one junior college are named for Lee: Washington and Lee University in Lexington, Virginia; and Lee College in Baytown, Texas, respectively. Lee Chapel at Washington and Lee University marks Lee's final resting place. Throughout the South, many primary and secondary schools were also named for him as well as private schools such as Robert E. Lee Academy in Bishopville, South Carolina.

In 1900, Lee was one of the first 29 individuals selected for the Hall of Fame for Great Americans (the first Hall of Fame in the United States), designed by Stanford White, on the Bronx, New York, campus of New York University, now a part of Bronx Community College.[178][179] However, his bust was removed in August 2017 by order of New York Governor Andrew Cuomo.[180]

Lee is featured on the 1925 Stone Mountain Memorial half dollar.

Robert E. Lee, National Statuary Hall, Washington, D.C. Edward Virginius Valentine, sculptor, 1909

 

Robert E Lee, Virginia Monument, Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, Frederick William Sievers, sculptor, 1917

 

Robert E. Lee Monument by Mercié, Monument Avenue, Richmond, Virginia, 1890

 

Statue of Lee at the Confederate War Memorial, Dallas, 1896

 

Statue of Lee in Murray, Kentucky

CSS Robert E. Lee

In 1862, the newly formed Confederate Navy purchased a 642-ton iron-hulled side-wheel gunboat, built in at Glasgow, Scotland, and gave her the name of CSS Robert E. Lee in honor of this Confederate General. During the next year, she became one of the South's most famous Confederate blockade runners, successfully making more than twenty runs through the Union blockade.[181]

The Mississippi River steamboat Robert E. Lee was named for Lee after the Civil War. It was the participant in an 1870 St. Louis – New Orleans race with the Natchez VI, which was featured in a Currier and Ives lithograph. The Robert E. Lee won the race.[182] The steamboat inspired the 1912 song Waiting for the Robert E. Lee by Lewis F. Muir and L. Wolfe Gilbert.[183] In more modern times, the USS Robert E. Lee, a George Washington-class submarine built in 1958, was named for Lee,[184] as was the M3 Lee tank, produced in 1941 and 1942.

The Commonwealth of Virginia issues an optional license plate honoring Lee, making reference to him as 'The Virginia Gentleman'.[185] In February 2014, a road on Fort Bliss previously named for Lee was renamed to honor Buffalo Soldiers.[186][187]

A recent biographer, Jonathan Horn, outlines the unsuccessful efforts in Washington to memorialize Lee in the naming of the Arlington Memorial Bridge after both Grant and Lee.[188]

Dates of rank

Rank Date Unit Component

Union army 2nd lt rank insignia.jpg Second Lieutenant July 1, 1829[189] Corps of Engineers United States Army

Union army 1st lt rank insignia.jpg First Lieutenant September 21, 1836[190] Corps of Engineers United States Army

Union army cpt rank insignia.jpg Captain August 7, 1838[190] Corps of Engineers United States Army

Union army maj rank insignia.jpg Brevet Major § April 18, 1847[190] Corps of Engineers United States Army

Union Army LTC rank insignia.png Brevet Lieutenant Colonel † August 20, 1847[190] Corps of Engineers United States Army

Union Army colonel rank insignia.png Brevet Colonel ‡ September 13, 1847[191] Corps of Engineers United States Army

Union Army LTC rank insignia.png Lieutenant Colonel March 3, 1855[191] 2nd Cavalry Regiment United States Army

Union Army colonel rank insignia.png Colonel March 16, 1861[191] 1st Cavalry Regiment United States Army

Major General April 22, 1861[192] Virginia Militia

Confederate States of America General-collar.svg Brigadier General May 14, 1861[193] Confederate States Army

Confederate States of America General-collar.svg General June 14, 1861[194] Confederate States Army

§ Breveted for conduct in the Battle of Cerro Gordo

† Breveted for conduct in Battles of Contreras and Churubusco

‡ Breveted for conduct in Battle of Chapultepec

In popular culture

Lee is a main character in the Shaara Family novels The Killer Angels (1974, Gettysburg), Gods and Generals (1996), and The Last Full Measure (2000), as well as the film adaptations of Gettysburg (1993) and Gods and Generals (2003). He is played by Martin Sheen in the former and by Lee's descendant Robert Duvall in the latter. Lee is portrayed as a hero in the historical children's novel Lee and Grant at Appomattox (1950) by MacKinlay Kantor. His part in the Civil War is told from the perspective of his horse in Richard Adams's book Traveller (1988).

Lee is an obvious subject for American Civil War alternate histories. Ward Moore's Bring the Jubilee (1953), MacKinlay Kantor's If the South Had Won the Civil War (1960), and Harry Turtledove's The Guns of the South (1992), all have Lee ending up as President of a victorious Confederacy and freeing the slaves (or laying the groundwork for the slaves to be freed in a later decade). Although Moore and Kantor's novels relegate him to a set of passing references, Lee is more of a main character in Turtledove's Guns. He is also the prime character of Turtledove's "Lee at the Alamo", which can be read online,[195] and sees the opening of the Civil War drastically altered so as to affect Lee's personal priorities considerably. Turtledove's "War Between the Provinces" series is an allegory of the Civil War told in the language of fairy tales, with Lee appearing as a knight named "Duke Edward of Arlington". Lee is also a knight in "The Charge of Lee's Brigade" in Alternate Generals volume 1, written by Turtledove's friend S. M. Stirling and featuring Lee, whose Virginia is still a loyal British colony, fighting for the Crown against the Russians in Crimea. In Lee Allred's "East of Appomattox" in Alternate Generals volume 3, Lee is the Confederate Minister to London circa 1868, desperately seeking help for a CSA which has turned out poorly suited to independence. Robert Skimin's Grey Victory features Lee as a supporting character preparing to run for the presidency in 1867.

In Connie Willis' 1987 novel Lincoln's Dreams, a research assistant meets a young woman who dreams about the Civil War from Robert E. Lee's point of view.

The Dodge Charger featured in the CBS television series The Dukes of Hazzard (1979–1985) was named The General Lee.[196][197] In the 2005 film based on this series, the car is driven past a statue of Lee, while the car's occupants salute him.

Thomas Jonathan "Stonewall" Jackson (January 21, 1824 – May 10, 1863) served as a Confederate general (1861–1863) during the American Civil War, and became one of the best-known Confederate commanders after General Robert E. Lee.[2] Jackson played a prominent role in nearly all military engagements in the Eastern Theater of the war until his death, and had a key part in winning many significant battles.

Born in what was then part of Virginia (in present-day West Virginia), Jackson received an appointment to the United States Military Academy at West Point and graduated in the class of 1846. He served in the U.S. Army during the Mexican–American War of 1846–1848 and distinguished himself at Chapultepec. From 1851 to 1861 he taught at the Virginia Military Institute, where he was unpopular with his students. During this time, he married twice. His first wife died giving birth, but his second wife, Mary Anna Morrison, lived until 1915. When Virginia seceded from the Union in May 1861 after the attack on Fort Sumter, Jackson joined the Confederate Army. He distinguished himself commanding a brigade at the First Battle of Bull Run in July, providing crucial reinforcements and beating back a fierce Union assault. In this context Barnard Elliott Bee Jr. compared him to a "stone wall", hence his enduring nickname.

Jackson performed exceptionally well in the campaigns in the Shenandoah Valley in 1862. Despite an initial defeat due largely to faulty intelligence, through swift and careful maneuvers Jackson was able to defeat three separate Union armies and prevent any of them from reinforcing General George B. McClellan's Army of the Potomac in its campaign against Richmond. Jackson then quickly moved his three divisions to reinforce General Lee's Army of Northern Virginia in defense of Richmond. He performed poorly in the Seven Days Battles against George B. McClellan's Army of the Potomac, as he was frequently late arriving on the field. During the Northern Virginia Campaign that summer, Jackson's troops captured and destroyed an important supply depot for General John Pope's Army of Virginia, and then withstood repeated assaults from Pope's troops at the Second Battle of Bull Run. Jackson's troops played a prominent role in September's Maryland Campaign, capturing the town of Harpers Ferry, a strategic location, and providing a defense of the Confederate Army's left at Antietam. At Fredericksburg in December, Jackson's corps buckled but ultimately beat back an assault by the Union Army under Major General Ambrose Burnside. In late April and early May 1863, faced with a larger Union army now commanded by Joseph Hooker at Chancellorsville, Lee divided his force three ways. On May 2, Jackson took his 30,000 troops and launched a surprise attack against the Union right flank, driving the opposing troops back about two miles. That evening he was accidentally shot by Confederate pickets. The general lost his left arm to amputation; weakened by his wounds, he died of pneumonia eight days later.

Military historians regard Jackson as one of the most gifted tactical commanders in U.S. history.[3] His tactics are studied even today. His death proved a severe setback for the Confederacy, affecting not only its military prospects, but also the morale of its army and the general public. After Jackson's death, his military exploits developed a legendary quality, becoming an important element of the ideology of the "Lost Cause".[4]

Contents

1 Ancestry

2 Early life

2.1 Early childhood

2.2 Working and teaching at Jackson's Mill

2.3 Brother against sister

3 Early military career

3.1 West Point

3.2 U.S. Army and the Mexican War

4 Lexington and the Virginia Military Institute

4.1 Slavery

4.2 Marriages and family life

4.3 John Brown raid aftermath

5 Civil War

5.1 First Battle of Bull Run

5.2 Valley Campaign

5.3 Peninsula

5.4 Second Bull Run to Fredericksburg

5.5 Chancellorsville

6 Death

7 Personal life

7.1 Physical ailments

7.2 Religion

7.3 Command style

7.4 Horsemanship

7.5 Mourning his death

7.6 Legacy

7.7 Descendants

7.8 Commemorations

8 Quotations

9 See also

10 Notes

11 References

12 Further reading

13 External links

Ancestry

Thomas Jonathan Jackson[5] was the great-grandson of John Jackson (1715/1719–1801) and Elizabeth Cummins (also known as Elizabeth Comings and Elizabeth Needles) (1723–1828). John Jackson was an Irish Protestant from Coleraine, County Londonderry, Ireland. While living in London, England, he was convicted of the capital crime of larceny for stealing £170; the judge at the Old Bailey sentenced him to seven years penal transportation. Elizabeth, a strong, blonde woman over 6 feet (180 cm) tall, born in London, was also convicted of felony larceny in an unrelated case for stealing 19 pieces of silver, jewelry, and fine lace, and received a similar sentence. They both were transported on the merchant ship Litchfield, which departed London in May 1749 with 150 convicts. John and Elizabeth met on board and were in love by the time the ship arrived at Annapolis, Maryland. Although they were sent to different locations in Maryland for their bond service, the couple married in July 1755.[6]

The family migrated west across the Blue Ridge Mountains to settle near Moorefield, Virginia (now West Virginia) in 1758. In 1770, they moved farther west to the Tygart Valley. They began to acquire large parcels of virgin farming land near the present-day town of Buckhannon, including 3,000 acres (12 km2) in Elizabeth's name. John and his two teenage sons, were early recruits for the American Revolutionary War, fighting in the Battle of Kings Mountain on October 7, 1780; John finished the war as captain and served as a lieutenant of the Virginia militia after 1787. While the men were in the Army, Elizabeth converted their home to a haven, "Jackson's Fort", for refugees from Indian attacks.[7]

John and Elizabeth had eight children. Their second son was Edward Jackson (1759–1828), and Edward's third son[8] was Jonathan Jackson, Thomas's father.[9] Jonathan's mother died on April 17, 1796. Three years later, on October 13, 1799, his father married Elizabeth Wetherholt, and they had nine more children.[10][11]

Early life

Early childhood

Thomas Jackson was born in the town of Clarksburg, Virginia, on January 21, 1824. He was the third child of Julia Beckwith (née Neale) Jackson (1798–1831) and Jonathan Jackson (1790–1826), an attorney. Both of Jackson's parents were natives of Virginia. The family already had two young children and were living in Clarksburg, in what is now West Virginia, when Thomas was born. He was named for his maternal grandfather. There is some dispute about the actual location of Jackson's birth. A historical marker on the floodwall in Parkersburg, West Virginia, claims that he was born in a cabin near that spot when his mother was visiting her parents who lived there. There are writings which indicate that in Jackson's early childhood, he was called "The Real Macaroni", though the origin of the nickname and whether it really existed are unclear.[12]

Thomas's sister Elizabeth (age six) died of typhoid fever on March 6, 1826, with two-year-old Thomas at her bedside. His father also died of a typhoid fever on March 26. Jackson's mother gave birth to Thomas's sister Laura Ann the day after Jackson's father died.[13] Julia Jackson thus was widowed at 28 and was left with much debt and three young children (including the newborn). She sold the family's possessions to pay the debts. She declined family charity and moved into a small rented one-room house. Julia took in sewing and taught school to support herself and her three young children for about four years.

In 1830, Julia Neale Jackson remarried, against the wishes of her friends. Her new husband, Captain Blake B. Woodson,[14] an attorney, did not like his stepchildren. There were continuing financial problems. The following year, after giving birth to Thomas's half-brother Willam Wirt Woodson, Julia died of complications, leaving her three older children orphaned.[15] Julia was buried in an unmarked grave in a homemade coffin in Westlake Cemetery along the James River and Kanawha Turnpike in Fayette County within the corporate limits of present-day Ansted, West Virginia.

Working and teaching at Jackson's Mill

Jackson's Mill

As their mother's health continued to fail, Jackson and his sister Laura Ann were sent to live with their half-uncle, Cummins Jackson, who owned a grist mill in Jackson's Mill (near present-day Weston in Lewis County in central West Virginia). Their older brother, Warren, went to live with other relatives on his mother's side of the family, but he later died of tuberculosis in 1841 at the age of twenty. Thomas and Laura Ann returned from Jackson's Mill in November 1831 to be at their dying mother's bedside. They spent four years together at the Mill before being separated—Laura Ann was sent to live with her mother's family, Thomas to live with his Aunt Polly (his father's sister) and her husband, Isaac Brake, on a farm four miles from Clarksburg. Thomas was treated by Brake as an outsider and, having suffered verbal abuse for over a year, ran away from the family. When his cousin in Clarksburg urged him to return to Aunt Polly's, he replied, "Maybe I ought to, ma'am, but I am not going to." He walked eighteen miles through mountain wilderness to Jackson's Mill, where he was welcomed by his uncles and he remained there for the following seven years.[16]

Cummins Jackson was strict with Thomas, who looked up to Cummins as a schoolteacher. Jackson helped around the farm, tending sheep with the assistance of a sheepdog, driving teams of oxen and helping harvest wheat and corn. Formal education was not easily obtained, but he attended school when and where he could. Much of Jackson's education was self-taught. He once made a deal with one of his uncle's slaves to provide him with pine knots in exchange for reading lessons; Thomas would stay up at night reading borrowed books by the light of those burning pine knots. Virginia law forbade teaching a slave, free black or mulatto to read or write; nevertheless, Jackson secretly taught the slave, as he had promised. Once literate, the young slave fled to Canada via the Underground Railroad.[17] In his later years at Jackson's Mill, Thomas served as a schoolteacher.

First lieutenant Thomas J. Jackson sometime after West Point graduation in the late 1840s

Brother against sister

The Civil War has sometimes been referred to as a war of "brother against brother," but in the case of the Jackson family, it was brother against sister. Laura Jackson Arnold was close to her brother Thomas until the Civil War period. As the war loomed, she became a staunch Unionist in a somewhat divided Harrison County. She was so strident in her beliefs that she expressed mixed feelings upon hearing of Thomas's death. One Union officer said that she seemed depressed at hearing the news, but her Unionism was stronger than her family bonds. In a letter, he wrote that Laura had said she "would rather know that he was dead than to have him a leader in the rebel army". Her Union sentiment also estranged her later from her husband, Jonathan Arnold.[18]

Early military career

Main article: Military career of Stonewall Jackson

West Point

In 1842, Jackson was accepted to the United States Military Academy at West Point, New York. Because of his inadequate schooling, he had difficulty with the entrance examinations and began his studies at the bottom of his class. Displaying a dogged determination that was to characterize his life, he became one of the hardest working cadets in the academy, and moved steadily up the academic rankings. Jackson graduated 17th out of 59 students in the Class of 1846.[19] It was said by his peers that if he had stayed there another year, he would have graduated first.

U.S. Army and the Mexican War

Stained-glass windows formerly in the Washington National Cathedral. At left top, Jackson reading the Bible in Confederate camp; left bottom, professor in Virginia Military Institute; bottom right, Mexican-American War; upper right, Jackson enters heaven. The windows were removed in 2017.[20]

Jackson began his United States Army career as a second lieutenant in the 1st U.S. Artillery Regiment and was sent to fight in the Mexican–American War from 1846 to 1848. He served at the Siege of Veracruz and the battles of Contreras, Chapultepec, and Mexico City, eventually earning two brevet promotions, and the regular army rank of first lieutenant. It was in Mexico that Thomas Jackson first met Robert E. Lee.

During the assault on Chapultepec Castle on September 13, 1847, he refused what he felt was a "bad order" to withdraw his troops. Confronted by his superior, he explained his rationale, claiming withdrawal was more hazardous than continuing his overmatched artillery duel. His judgment proved correct, and a relieving brigade was able to exploit the advantage Jackson had broached. In contrast to this display of strength of character, he obeyed what he also felt was a "bad order" when he raked a civilian throng with artillery fire after the Mexican authorities failed to surrender Mexico City at the hour demanded by the U.S. forces.[21] The former episode, and later aggressive action against the retreating Mexican army, earned him field promotion to the brevet rank of major.[19]

After the war, Jackson was briefly assigned to forts in New York, and then to Florida during the Second Interbellum of the Seminole Wars, during which the Americans were attempting to force the remaining Seminoles to move West. He was stationed briefly at Fort Casey before being named second-in-command at Fort Meade, a small fort about thirty miles south of Tampa.[22] His commanding officer was Major William H. French. Jackson and French disagreed often, and filed numerous complaints against each other. Jackson stayed in Florida less than a year.[23]

Lexington and the Virginia Military Institute

Stonewall Jackson

In the spring of 1851,[24] Jackson accepted a newly created teaching position at the Virginia Military Institute (VMI), in Lexington, Virginia. He became Professor of Natural and Experimental Philosophy and Instructor of Artillery. Parts of Jackson's curriculum are still taught at VMI, regarded as timeless military essentials: discipline, mobility, assessing the enemy's strength and intentions while attempting to conceal your own, and the efficiency of artillery combined with an infantry assault.

Though he spent a great deal of time preparing in depth for each class meeting, Jackson was unpopular as a teacher. His students called him "Tom Fool". He memorized his lectures and then recited them to the class; any student who came to ask for help was given the same explanation as before. And if a student asked for help a second time, Jackson viewed him as insubordinate and punished him. For his tests, Jackson typically had students simply recite memorized information that he had given them. The students mocked his apparently stern, religious nature and his eccentric traits. In 1856, a group of alumni attempted to have Jackson removed from his position.[25]

Jackson's peculiar personal traits contributed to his unpopularity as an educator. With little sense of humor, he once tried to get a cadet dismissed from VMI for playing a prank on him. He was a hypochondriac who had sinus problems and arthritis and stood for long periods of time to keep his internal organs in place, a tiring activity that he believed contributed to good health. He rarely ate much food and often subsisted on crackers and milk. He required little sleep but was known to take catnaps. He liked mineral baths.[26]

The founder of VMI and one of its first two faculty members was John Thomas Lewis Preston. Preston's second wife, Margaret Junkin Preston, was the sister of Jackson's first wife, Elinor. In addition to working together on the VMI faculty, Preston taught Sunday School with Jackson and served on his staff during the Civil War.[27]

Slavery

Stonewall Jackson in 1855

Little known as he was to the white inhabitants of Lexington, Jackson was known by many of the African Americans in town, both slaves and free blacks.[citation needed] In 1855, he organized Sunday School classes for blacks at the Presbyterian Church. His second wife, Mary Anna Jackson, taught with Jackson, as "he preferred that my labors should be given to the colored children, believing that it was more important and useful to put the strong hand of the Gospel under the ignorant African race, to lift them up".[28] The pastor, Dr. William Spottswood White, described the relationship between Jackson and his Sunday afternoon students: "In their religious instruction he succeeded wonderfully. His discipline was systematic and firm, but very kind. ... His servants reverenced and loved him, as they would have done a brother or father. ... He was emphatically the black man's friend." He addressed his students by name and they, in turn, referred to him affectionately as "Marse Major".[29]

Jackson owned six slaves in the late 1850s. Three (Hetty, Cyrus, and George, a mother and two teenage sons) were received as part of the dowry at his marriage to Mary Anna Jackson.[30] Another slave, Albert, requested that Jackson purchase him and allow him to work for his freedom; he was employed as a waiter in one of the Lexington hotels and Jackson rented him to VMI. Amy also requested that Jackson purchase her from a public slave auction and she served the family as a cook and housekeeper. The sixth, Emma, was a four-year-old orphan with a learning disability, accepted by Jackson from an aged widow and presented to his second wife, Mary Anna, as a welcome-home gift.[31] After Jackson was shot at Chancellorsville, a slave "Jim Lewis, had stayed with Jackson in the small house as he lay dying".[32] Mary Anna Jackson, in her 1895 memoir, said, "our servants ... without the firm guidance and restraint of their master, the excitement of the times proved so demoralizing to them that he deemed it best for me to provide them with good homes among the permanent residents".[33] James Robertson wrote about Jackson's view on slavery:

Jackson neither apologized for nor spoke in favor of the practice of slavery. He probably opposed the institution. Yet in his mind the Creator had sanctioned slavery, and man had no moral right to challenge its existence. The good Christian slaveholder was one who treated his servants fairly and humanely at all times.[34]

Marriages and family life

House owned by Stonewall Jackson in Lexington

While an instructor at VMI in 1853, Thomas Jackson married Elinor "Ellie" Junkin, whose father, George Junkin, was president of Washington College (later named Washington and Lee University) in Lexington. An addition was built onto the president's residence for the Jacksons, and when Robert E. Lee became president of Washington College he lived in the same home, now known as the Lee–Jackson House.[35] Ellie gave birth to a stillborn son on October 22, 1854, experiencing a hemorrhage an hour later that proved fatal.[36]

After a tour of Europe, Jackson married again, in 1857. Mary Anna Morrison was from North Carolina, where her father was the first president of Davidson College. Her sister, Isabella Morrison, was married to Daniel Harvey Hill. They had a daughter named Mary Graham on April 30, 1858, but the baby died less than a month later. Another daughter was born in 1862, shortly before her father's death. The Jacksons named her Julia Laura, after his mother and sister.

Jackson purchased the only house he ever owned while in Lexington. Built in 1801, the brick town house at 8 East Washington Street was purchased by Jackson in 1859. He lived in it for two years before being called to serve in the Confederacy. Jackson never returned to his home.

John Brown raid aftermath

In November 1859, at the request of the governor of Virginia, Major William Gilham led a contingent of the VMI Cadet Corps to Charles Town to provide an additional military presence at the hanging of militant abolitionist John Brown on December 2, following his raid on the federal arsenal at Harpers Ferry on October 16. Major Jackson was placed in command of the artillery, consisting of two howitzers manned by twenty-one cadets.

Civil War

The Colonel Lewis T. Moore house, which served as the Winchester Headquarters of Lt. Gen. T. J. "Stonewall" Jackson (photo 2007)

In 1861, after Virginia seceded from the Union and as the American Civil War broke out, Jackson became a drill master for some of the many new recruits in the Confederate Army. On April 27, 1861, Virginia Governor John Letcher ordered Colonel Jackson to take command at Harpers Ferry, where he would assemble and command the unit which later gained fame as the "Stonewall Brigade", consisting of the 2nd, 4th, 5th, 27th, and 33rd Virginia Infantry regiments. All of these units were from the Shenandoah Valley region of Virginia, where Jackson located his headquarters throughout the first two years of the war. Jackson became known for his relentless drilling of his troops; he believed discipline was vital to success on the battlefield. Following raids on the B&O Railroad on May 24, he was promoted to brigadier general on June 17.[37]

First Battle of Bull Run

Main article: Winchester, Virginia in the American Civil War

General Jackson by Augusto Ferrer-Dalmau

Jackson rose to prominence and earned his most famous nickname at the First Battle of Bull Run (First Manassas) on July 21, 1861. As the Confederate lines began to crumble under heavy Union assault, Jackson's brigade provided crucial reinforcements on Henry House Hill, demonstrating the discipline he instilled in his men. Although under heavy fire for several continuous hours, Jackson received a wound, breaking the middle finger of his left hand; about midway between the hand and knuckle, the ball passing on the side next the index finger. The troops of South Carolina, commanded by Gen. Barnard Elliott Bee Jr. had been overwhelmed, and he rode up to Jackson in despair, exclaiming, "They are beating us back!" "Then," said Jackson, "we will give them the bayonet!" As he rode back to his command, Bee exhorted his own troops to re-form by shouting, "There is Jackson standing like a stone wall. Let us determine to die here, and we will conquer. Rally behind the Virginians!"[38] There is some controversy over Bee's statement and intent, which could not be clarified because he was killed almost immediately after speaking and none of his subordinate officers wrote reports of the battle. Major Burnett Rhett, chief of staff to General Joseph E. Johnston, claimed that Bee was angry at Jackson's failure to come immediately to the relief of Bee's and Francis S. Bartow's brigades while they were under heavy pressure. Those who subscribe to this opinion believe that Bee's statement was meant to be pejorative: "Look at Jackson standing there like a stone wall!"[39]

Regardless of the controversy and the delay in relieving Bee, Jackson's brigade, which would thenceforth be known as the Stonewall Brigade, stopped the Union assault and suffered more casualties than any other Southern brigade that day; Jackson has since then been generally known as Stonewall Jackson.[40] During the battle, Jackson displayed a gesture common to him and held his left arm skyward with the palm facing forward – interpreted by his soldiers variously as an eccentricity or an entreaty to God for success in combat. His hand was struck by a bullet or a piece of shrapnel and he suffered a small loss of bone in his middle finger. He refused medical advice to have the finger amputated.[41] After the battle, Jackson was promoted to major general (October 7, 1861)[37] and given command of the Valley District, with headquarters in Winchester.

Valley Campaign

Further information: Valley Campaign

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In the spring of 1862, Union Maj. Gen. George B. McClellan's Army of the Potomac approached Richmond from the southeast in the Peninsula Campaign. Maj. Gen. Irvin McDowell's large corps was poised to hit Richmond from the north, and Maj. Gen. Nathaniel P. Banks's army threatened the Shenandoah Valley. Jackson was ordered by Richmond to operate in the Valley to defeat Banks's threat and prevent McDowell's troops from reinforcing McClellan.

Jackson possessed the attributes to succeed against his poorly coordinated and sometimes timid opponents: a combination of great audacity, excellent knowledge and shrewd use of the terrain, and an uncommon ability to inspire his troops to great feats of marching and fighting.

Historical marker marking the end of Gen. Stonewall Jackson's pursuit of the Federals after the Battle of McDowell, May 12, 1862

The campaign started with a tactical defeat at Kernstown on March 23, 1862, when faulty intelligence led him to believe he was attacking a small detachment. But it became a strategic victory for the Confederacy, because his aggressiveness suggested that he possessed a much larger force, convincing President Abraham Lincoln to keep Banks' troops in the Valley and McDowell's 30,000-man corps near Fredericksburg, subtracting about 50,000 soldiers from McClellan's invasion force. As it transpired, it was Jackson's only defeat in the Valley.

By adding Maj. Gen. Richard S. Ewell's large division and Maj. Gen. Edward "Allegheny" Johnson's small division, Jackson increased his army to 17,000 men. He was still significantly outnumbered, but attacked portions of his divided enemy individually at McDowell, defeating both Brig. Gens. Robert H. Milroy and Robert C. Schenck. He defeated Banks at Front Royal and Winchester, ejecting him from the Valley. Lincoln decided that the defeat of Jackson was an immediate priority (though Jackson's orders were solely to keep Union forces occupied away from Richmond). He ordered Irvin McDowell to send 20,000 men to Front Royal and Maj. Gen. John C. Frémont to move to Harrisonburg. If both forces could converge at Strasburg, Jackson's only escape route up the Valley would be cut.

After a series of maneuvers, Jackson defeated Frémont's command at Cross Keys and Brig. Gen. James Shields at Port Republic on June 8–9. Union forces were withdrawn from the Valley.

It was a classic military campaign of surprise and maneuver. Jackson pressed his army to travel 646 miles (1,040 km) in 48 days of marching and won five significant victories with a force of about 17,000 against a combined force of 60,000. Stonewall Jackson's reputation for moving his troops so rapidly earned them the oxymoronic nickname "foot cavalry". He became the most celebrated soldier in the Confederacy (until he was eventually eclipsed by Lee) and lifted the morale of the Southern public.

Peninsula

McClellan's Peninsula Campaign toward Richmond stalled at the Battle of Seven Pines on May 31 and June 1. After the Valley Campaign ended in mid-June, Jackson and his troops were called to join Robert E. Lee's Army of Northern Virginia in defense of the capital. By utilizing a railroad tunnel under the Blue Ridge Mountains and then transporting troops to Hanover County on the Virginia Central Railroad, Jackson and his forces made a surprise appearance in front of McClellan at Mechanicsville. Reports had last placed Jackson's forces in the Shenandoah Valley; their presence near Richmond added greatly to the Union commander's overestimation of the strength and numbers of the forces before him. This proved a crucial factor in McClellan's decision to re-establish his base at a point many miles downstream from Richmond on the James River at Harrison's Landing, essentially a retreat that ended the Peninsula Campaign and prolonged the war almost three more years.

Jackson's troops served well under Lee in the series of battles known as the Seven Days Battles, but Jackson's own performance in those battles is generally considered to be poor.[42] He arrived late at Mechanicsville and inexplicably ordered his men to bivouac for the night within clear earshot of the battle. He was late at Savage's Station. At White Oak Swamp he failed to employ fording places to cross White Oak Swamp Creek, attempting for hours to rebuild a bridge, which limited his involvement to an ineffectual artillery duel and a missed opportunity to intervene decisively at the Battle of Glendale, which was raging nearby. At Malvern Hill Jackson participated in the futile, piecemeal frontal assaults against entrenched Union infantry and massed artillery, and suffered heavy casualties (but this was a problem for all of Lee's army in that ill-considered battle). The reasons for Jackson's sluggish and poorly coordinated actions during the Seven Days are disputed, although a severe lack of sleep after the grueling march and railroad trip from the Shenandoah Valley was probably a significant factor. Both Jackson and his troops were completely exhausted. An explanation for this and other lapses by Jackson was tersely offered by his colleague and brother in-law General Daniel Harvey Hill: "Jackson's genius never shone when he was under the command of another."[43]

Second Bull Run to Fredericksburg

Jackson and Little Sorrel, painting by David Bendann

Montage of Thomas J. Jackson and staff

The military reputations of Lee's corps commanders are often characterized as Stonewall Jackson representing the audacious, offensive component of Lee's army, whereas his counterpart, James Longstreet, more typically advocated and executed defensive strategies and tactics. Jackson has been described as the army's hammer, Longstreet its anvil.[44] In the Northern Virginia Campaign of August 1862 this stereotype did not hold true. Longstreet commanded the Right Wing (later to become known as the First Corps) and Jackson commanded the Left Wing. Jackson started the campaign under Lee's orders with a sweeping flanking maneuver that placed his corps into the rear of Union Maj. Gen. John Pope's Army of Virginia. The Hotchkiss journal shows that Jackson, most likely, originally conceived the movement. In the journal entries for March 4 and 6, 1863, General Stuart tells Hotchkiss that "Jackson was entitled to all the credit" for the movement and that Lee thought the proposed movement "very hazardous" and "reluctantly consented" to the movement.[45] At Manassas Junction, Jackson was able to capture all of the supplies of the Union Army depot. Then he had his troops destroy all of it, for it was the main depot for the Union Army. Jackson then retreated and then took up a defensive position and effectively invited Pope to assault him. On August 28–29, the start of the Second Battle of Bull Run (Second Manassas), Pope launched repeated assaults against Jackson as Longstreet and the remainder of the army marched north to reach the battlefield.

On August 30, Pope came to believe that Jackson was starting to retreat, and Longstreet took advantage of this by launching a massive assault on the Union army's left with over 25,000 men. Although the Union troops put up a furious defense, Pope's army was forced to retreat in a manner similar to the embarrassing Union defeat at First Bull Run, fought on roughly the same battleground.

When Lee decided to invade the North in the Maryland Campaign, Jackson took Harpers Ferry, then hastened to join the rest of the army at Sharpsburg, Maryland, where they fought McClellan in the Battle of Antietam (Sharpsburg). Antietam was primarily a defensive battle against superior odds, although McClellan failed to exploit his advantage. Jackson's men bore the brunt of the initial attacks on the northern end of the battlefield and, at the end of the day, successfully resisted a breakthrough on the southern end when Jackson's subordinate, Maj. Gen. A. P. Hill, arrived at the last minute from Harpers Ferry. The Confederate forces held their position, but the battle was extremely bloody for both sides, and Lee withdrew the Army of Northern Virginia back across the Potomac River, ending the invasion. On October 10, Jackson was promoted to lieutenant general, being ranked just behind Lee and Longstreet and his command was redesignated the Second Corps.

Before the armies camped for winter, Jackson's Second Corps held off a strong Union assault against the right flank of the Confederate line at the Battle of Fredericksburg, in what became a Confederate victory. Just before the battle, Jackson was delighted to receive a letter about the birth of his daughter, Julia Laura Jackson, on November 23.[46] Also before the battle, Maj. Gen. J. E. B. Stuart, Lee's dashing and well-dressed cavalry commander, presented to Jackson a fine general's frock coat that he had ordered from one of the best tailors in Richmond. Jackson's previous coat was threadbare and colorless from exposure to the elements, its buttons removed by admiring ladies. Jackson asked his staff to thank Stuart, saying that although the coat was too handsome for him, he would cherish it as a souvenir. His staff insisted that he wear it to dinner, which caused scores of soldiers to rush to see him in uncharacteristic garb. Jackson was so embarrassed with the attention that he did not wear the new uniform for months.[47]

Chancellorsville

At the Battle of Chancellorsville, the Army of Northern Virginia was faced with a serious threat by the Army of the Potomac and its new commanding general, Major General Joseph Hooker. General Lee decided to employ a risky tactic to take the initiative and offensive away from Hooker's new southern thrust – he decided to divide his forces. Jackson and his entire corps went on an aggressive flanking maneuver to the right of the Union lines: this flanking movement would be one of the most successful and dramatic of the war. While riding with his infantry in a wide berth well south and west of the Federal line of battle, Jackson employed Maj. Gen. Fitzhugh Lee's cavalry to provide for better reconnaissance regarding the exact location of the Union right and rear. The results were far better than even Jackson could have hoped. Fitzhugh Lee found the entire right side of the Federal lines in the middle of open field, guarded merely by two guns that faced westward, as well as the supplies and rear encampments. The men were eating and playing games in carefree fashion, completely unaware that an entire Confederate corps was less than a mile away. What happened next is given in Fitzhugh Lee's own words:

General Jackson's "Chancellorsville" portrait, taken at a Spotsylvania County farm on April 26, 1863, seven days before he was wounded at the Battle of Chancellorsville

Lower right photograph of trees shattered by artillery shells near where Jackson was shot on the Orange Plank Road

So impressed was I with my discovery, that I rode rapidly back to the point on the Plank road where I had left my cavalry, and back down the road Jackson was moving, until I met "Stonewall" himself. "General", said I, "if you will ride with me, halting your column here, out of sight, I will show you the enemy's right, and you will perceive the great advantage of attacking down the Old turnpike instead of the Plank road, the enemy's lines being taken in reverse. Bring only one courier, as you will be in view from the top of the hill." Jackson assented, and I rapidly conducted him to the point of observation. There had been no change in the picture. I only knew Jackson slightly. I watched him closely as he gazed upon Howard's troops. It was then about 2 pm. His eyes burned with a brilliant glow, lighting up a sad face. His expression was one of intense interest, his face was colored slightly with the paint of approaching battle, and radiant at the success of his flank movement. To the remarks made to him while the unconscious line of blue was pointed out, he did not reply once during the five minutes he was on the hill, and yet his lips were moving. From what I have read and heard of Jackson since that day, I know now what he was doing then. Oh! "beware of rashness", General Hooker. Stonewall Jackson is praying in full view and in rear of your right flank! While talking to the Great God of Battles, how could he hear what a poor cavalryman was saying. "Tell General Rodes", said he, suddenly whirling his horse towards the courier, "to move across the Old plank road; halt when he gets to the Old turnpike, and I will join him there." One more look upon the Federal lines, and then he rode rapidly down the hill, his arms flapping to the motion of his horse, over whose head it seemed, good rider as he was, he would certainly go. I expected to be told I had made a valuable personal reconnaissance—saving the lives of many soldiers, and that Jackson was indebted to me to that amount at least. Perhaps I might have been a little chagrined at Jackson's silence, and hence commented inwardly and adversely upon his horsemanship. Alas! I had looked upon him for the last time.

— Fitzhugh Lee, address to the Association of the Army of Northern Virginia, 1879

Jackson immediately returned to his corps and arranged his divisions into a line of battle to charge directly into the oblivious Federal right. The Confederates marched silently until they were merely several hundred feet from the Union position, then released a bloodthirsty cry and full charge. Many of the Federal soldiers were captured without a shot fired, the rest were driven into a full rout. Jackson pursued relentlessly back toward the center of the Federal line until dusk.

Darkness ended the assault. As Jackson and his staff were returning to camp on May 2, they were mistaken for a Union cavalry force by the 18th North Carolina Infantry regiment who shouted, "Halt, who goes there?", but fired before evaluating the reply. Frantic shouts by Jackson's staff identifying the party were replied to by Major John D. Barry with the retort, "It's a damned Yankee trick! Fire!"[48] A second volley was fired in response; in all, Jackson was hit by three bullets, two in the left arm and one in the right hand. Several other men in his staff were killed, in addition to many horses. Darkness and confusion prevented Jackson from getting immediate care. He was dropped from his stretcher while being evacuated because of incoming artillery rounds. Because of his injuries, Jackson's left arm had to be amputated by Dr. Hunter McGuire.[49] Jackson was moved to Thomas C. Chandler's 740 acres (3.0 km2) plantation named Fairfield. He was offered Chandler's home for recovery, but Jackson refused and suggested using Chandler's plantation office building instead. He was thought to be out of harm's way; but unknown to the doctors, he already had classic symptoms of pneumonia, complaining of a sore chest. This soreness was mistakenly thought to be the result of his rough handling in the battlefield evacuation.

Death

The plantation office building where Stonewall Jackson died in Guinea Station, Virginia

Lee wrote to Jackson after learning of his injuries, stating: "Could I have directed events, I would have chosen for the good of the country to be disabled in your stead."[50] Jackson died of complications from pneumonia on May 10, 1863, eight days after he was shot. On his deathbed, though he became weaker, he remained spiritually strong, saying towards the end: "It is the Lord's Day; my wish is fulfilled. I have always desired to die on Sunday."

Dr. McGuire wrote an account of Jackson's final hours and last words:

A few moments before he died he cried out in his delirium, 'Order A.P. Hill to prepare for action! Pass the infantry to the front rapidly! Tell Major Hawks—' then stopped, leaving the sentence unfinished. Presently a smile of ineffable sweetness spread itself over his pale face, and he said quietly, and with an expression, as if of relief, 'Let us cross over the river, and rest under the shade of the trees.'[51]

His body was moved to the Governor's Mansion in Richmond for the public to mourn, and he was then moved to be buried in Oak Grove Cemetery, Lexington, Virginia. The arm that was amputated on May 2 was buried separately by Jackson's chaplain (Beverly Tucker Lacy), at the J. Horace Lacy house, "Ellwood", (now preserved at the Fredericksburg National Battlefield) in the Wilderness of Orange County, near the field hospital.[52]

Upon hearing of Jackson's death, Robert E. Lee mourned the loss of both a friend and a trusted commander. As Jackson lay dying, Lee sent a message through Chaplain Lacy, saying: "Give General Jackson my affectionate regards, and say to him: he has lost his left arm but I my right."[53] The night Lee learned of Jackson's death, he told his cook: "William, I have lost my right arm", and, "I'm bleeding at the heart."[54]

Harper's Weekly reported Jackson's death on May 23, 1863, as follows:

DEATH OF STONEWALL JACKSON.

General "Stonewall" Jackson was badly wounded in the arm at the battles of Chancellorsville, and had his arm amputated. Jackson initially appeared to be healing, but he died from pneumonia on May 10, 1863.[55]

Personal life

In 1864 Jackson was memorialized on the Confederate $500 banknote.

Jackson's sometimes unusual command style and personality traits, combined with his frequent success in battle, contribute to his legacy as one of the greatest generals of the Civil War.[56] He was martial and stern in attitude and profoundly religious, a deacon in the Presbyterian Church. One of his many nicknames was "Old Blue Lights,"[57] a term applied to a military man whose evangelical zeal burned with the intensity of the blue light used for night-time display.[58]

Physical ailments

Jackson held a lifelong belief that one of his arms was longer than the other, and thus usually held the "longer" arm up to equalize his circulation. He was described as a "champion sleeper", and occasionally even fell asleep with food in his mouth. Jackson suffered a number of ailments, for which he sought relief via contemporary practices of his day including hydrotherapy, popular in America at that time, visiting establishments at Oswego, New York (1850) and Round Hill, Massachusetts (1860) although with little evidence of success.[59][60] Jackson also suffered a significant hearing loss in both of his ears as a result of his prior service in the U.S. Army, as an artillery officer.

A recurring story concerns Jackson's love of lemons, which he allegedly gnawed whole to alleviate symptoms of dyspepsia (indigestion). General Richard Taylor, son of President Zachary Taylor, wrote a passage in his war memoirs about Jackson eating lemons: "Where Jackson got his lemons 'no fellow could find out,' but he was rarely without one."[61] However, recent research by his biographer, James I. Robertson, Jr., has found that none of Jackson's contemporaries, including members of his staff, his friends, or his wife, recorded any unusual obsessions with lemons. Jackson thought of a lemon as a "rare treat ... enjoyed greatly whenever it could be obtained from the enemy's camp". Jackson was fond of all fruits, particularly peaches, "but he enjoyed with relish lemons, oranges, watermelons, apples, grapes, berries, or whatever was available".[62]

Religion

Jackson's religion has often been discussed. His biographer, Robert Lewis Dabney, suggested that "It was the fear of God which made him so fearless of all else."[63] Jackson himself had said, "My religious belief teaches me to feel as safe in battle as in bed."[64]

Prayer in "Stonewall" Jackson's camp, 1866

Stephen W. Sears states that "Jackson was fanatical in his Presbyterian faith, and it energized his military thought and character. Theology was the only subject he genuinely enjoyed discussing. His dispatches invariably credited an ever-kind Providence." According to Sears, "this fanatical religiosity had drawbacks. It warped Jackson's judgment of men, leading to poor appointments; it was said he preferred good Presbyterians to good soldiers."[65] James I. Robertson, Jr. suggests that Jackson was "a Christian soldier in every sense of the word". According to Robertson, Jackson "thought of the war as a religious crusade", and "viewed himself as an Old Testament warrior—like David or Joshua—who went into battle to slay the Philistines".[66]

Jackson encouraged the Confederate States Army revival that occurred in 1863,[67] although it was probably more of a grass-roots movement than a top-down revival.[68] Jackson strictly observed the Sunday Sabbath. James I. Robertson, Jr. notes that "no place existed in his Sunday schedule for labor, newspapers, or secular conversation".[69]

Command style

A portrait of Stonewall Jackson (1864, J. W. King) in the National Portrait Gallery

In command, Jackson was extremely secretive about his plans and extremely meticulous about military discipline. This secretive nature did not stand him in good stead with his subordinates, who were often not aware of his overall operational intentions until the last minute, and who complained of being left out of key decisions.[70]

Robert E. Lee could trust Jackson with deliberately undetailed orders that conveyed Lee's overall objectives, what modern doctrine calls the "end state". This was because Jackson had a talent for understanding Lee's sometimes unstated goals, and Lee trusted Jackson with the ability to take whatever actions were necessary to implement his end state requirements. Few of Lee's subsequent corps commanders had this ability. At Gettysburg, this resulted in lost opportunities. With a defeated and disorganized Union Army trying to regroup on high ground near town and vulnerable, Lee sent one of his new corps commanders, Richard S. Ewell, discretionary orders that the heights (Cemetery Hill and Culp's Hill) be taken "if practicable". Without Jackson's intuitive grasp of Lee's orders or the instinct to take advantage of sudden tactical opportunities, Ewell chose not to attempt the assault, and this failure is considered by historians to be the greatest missed opportunity of the battle.[71]

Horsemanship

Jackson had a poor reputation as a horseman. One of his soldiers, Georgia volunteer William Andrews, wrote that Jackson was "a very ordinary looking man of medium size, his uniform badly soiled as though it had seen hard service. He wore a cap pulled down nearly to his nose and was riding a rawboned horse that did not look much like a charger, unless it would be on hay or clover. He certainly made a poor figure on a horseback, with his stirrup leather six inches too short, putting his knees nearly level with his horse's back, and his heels turned out with his toes sticking behind his horse's foreshoulder. A sorry description of our most famous general, but a correct one."[72] His horse was named "Little Sorrel" (also known as "Old Sorrel"), a small chestnut gelding which was a captured Union horse from a Connecticut farm.[73][74] He rode Little Sorrel throughout the war, and was riding him when he was shot at Chancellorsville. Little Sorrel died at age 36 and is buried near a statue of Jackson on the parade grounds of VMI. (His mounted hide is on display in the VMI Museum.)[75]

Mourning his death

General Lee's Last Visit to Stonewall Jackson's Grave, painting by Louis Eckhardt, 1872

After the war, Jackson's wife and young daughter Julia moved from Lexington to North Carolina. Mary Anna Jackson wrote[76] two books about her husband's life, including some of his letters. She never remarried, and was known as the "Widow of the Confederacy", living until 1915. His daughter Julia married, and bore children, but she died of typhoid fever at the age of 26 years.[77]

Legacy

Many theorists through the years have postulated that if Jackson had lived, Lee might have prevailed at Gettysburg.[78] Certainly Jackson's discipline and tactical sense were sorely missed.

General George Patton of World War II fame as a boy prayed next to two portraits of Robert E. Lee and Stonewall Jackson, whom he assumed were God and Jesus.[79] He once told Dwight D. Eisenhower "I will be your Jackson."[80] General Douglas MacArthur called Robert L. Eichelberger his Stonewall Jackson.[81] Chesty Puller idolized Jackson, and carried George Henderson's biography of Jackson with him on campaigns.[82] Alexander Vandegrift also idolized Jackson.

Descendants

Jackson's grandson and great-grandson, both namesakes, Thomas Jonathan Jackson Christian (1888-1952) and Thomas Jonathan Jackson Christian Jr. (1915-1944), both graduated from West Point. The elder Christian was a career US Army officer who served during both World Wars and rose to the rank of brigadier general.[citation needed] The younger Christian was a colonel in command of the 361st Fighter Group flying P-51 Mustangs in the European Theater of Operations in World War II when he was killed in action in August 1944; his personal aircraft, Lou IV, was one of the most photographed P-51s in the war.[83]

Commemorations

Main article: List of memorials to Stonewall Jackson

The Stonewall Brigade, Dedicated to the Memory of Stonewall Jackson, the Immortal Southern Hero, and His Brave Veterans, Sheet music, 1863

As an important element of the ideology of the "Lost Cause", Jackson has been commemorated in numerous ways, including with statues, currency, and postage.[4] A poem penned during the war soon became a popular song, "Stonewall Jackson's Way". The Stonewall Brigade Band is still active today.

Confederate Loan from March 2, 1863, Vignette with Jackson

West Virginia's Stonewall Jackson State Park is named in his honor. Nearby, at Stonewall Jackson's historical childhood home, his uncle's grist mill is the centerpiece of a historical site at the Jackson's Mill Center for Lifelong Learning and State 4-H Camp. The facility, located near Weston, serves as a special campus for West Virginia University and the WVU Extension Service.

During a training exercise in Virginia by U.S. Marines in 1921, the Marine commander, General Smedley Butler was told by a local farmer that Stonewall Jackson's arm was buried nearby under a granite marker, to which Butler replied, "Bosh! I will take a squad of Marines and dig up that spot to prove you wrong!"[84] Butler found the arm in a box under the marker. He later replaced the wooden box with a metal one, and reburied the arm. He left a plaque on the granite monument marking the burial place of Jackson's arm; the plaque is no longer on the marker but can be viewed at the Chancellorsville Battlefield visitor's center.[84][85]

Beginning in 1904 the Commonwealth of Virginia celebrated Jackson's birthday as a state holiday; the observance was eliminated, with Election Day as a replacement holiday, effective July 2020.[86][87][88][89]

Jackson is featured on the 1925 Stone Mountain Memorial half dollar.

A Stonewall Jackson Monument was unveiled on October 11, 1919,[90] in Richmond, Virginia, then taken down on July 1, 2020, During the 2020–2021 United States racial unrest.[91][92] Its removal was live-streamed by news outlets and onlookers on various websites and social media platforms.

The Battle of Chancellorsville was a major battle of the American Civil War (1861–1865), and the principal engagement of the Chancellorsville campaign.[13] It was fought from April 30 to May 6, 1863, in Spotsylvania County, Virginia, near the village of Chancellorsville. Two related battles were fought nearby on May 3 in the vicinity of Fredericksburg. The campaign pitted Union Army Maj. Gen. Joseph Hooker's Army of the Potomac against an army less than half its size, General Robert E. Lee's Confederate Army of Northern Virginia.

Chancellorsville is known as Lee's "perfect battle" because his risky decision to divide his army in the presence of a much larger enemy force resulted in a significant Confederate victory. The victory, a product of Lee's audacity and Hooker's timid decision-making, was tempered by heavy casualties, including Lt. Gen. Thomas J. "Stonewall" Jackson. Jackson was hit by friendly fire, requiring his left arm to be amputated. He died of pneumonia eight days later, a loss that Lee likened to losing his right arm.

The two armies faced off against each other at Fredericksburg during the winter of 1862-1863. The Chancellorsville campaign began when Hooker secretly moved the bulk of his army up the left bank of the Rappahannock River, then crossed it on the morning of April 27, 1863. Union cavalry under Maj. Gen. George Stoneman began a long-distance raid against Lee's supply lines at about the same time. This operation was completely ineffectual. Crossing the Rapidan River via Germanna and Ely's Fords, the Federal infantry concentrated near Chancellorsville on April 30. Combined with the Union force facing Fredericksburg, Hooker planned a double envelopment, attacking Lee from both his front and rear.

On May 1, Hooker advanced from Chancellorsville toward Lee, but the Confederate general split his army in the face of superior numbers, leaving a small force at Fredericksburg to deter Maj. Gen. John Sedgwick from advancing, while he attacked Hooker's advance with about four-fifths of his army. Despite the objections of his subordinates, Hooker withdrew his men to the defensive lines around Chancellorsville, ceding the initiative to Lee. On May 2, Lee divided his army again, sending Stonewall Jackson's entire corps on a flanking march that routed the Union XI Corps. While performing a personal reconnaissance in advance of his line, Jackson was wounded by fire after dark from his own men close between the lines, and cavalry commander Maj. Gen. J. E. B. Stuart temporarily replaced him as corps commander.

The fiercest fighting of the battle—and the second bloodiest day of the Civil War—occurred on May 3 as Lee launched multiple attacks against the Union position at Chancellorsville, resulting in heavy losses on both sides and the pulling back of Hooker's main army. That same day, Sedgwick advanced across the Rappahannock River, defeated the small Confederate force at Marye's Heights in the Second Battle of Fredericksburg, and then moved to the west. The Confederates fought a successful delaying action at the Battle of Salem Church. On the 4th Lee turned his back on Hooker and attacked Sedgwick, and drove him back to Banks' Ford, surrounding them on three sides. Sedgwick withdrew across the ford early on May 5. Lee turned back to confront Hooker who withdrew the remainder of his army across U.S. Ford the night of May 5–6.

The campaign ended on May 7 when Stoneman's cavalry reached Union lines east of Richmond. Both armies resumed their previous position across the Rappahannock from each other at Fredericksburg. With the loss of Jackson, Lee reorganized his army, and flush with victory began what was to become the Gettysburg campaign a month later.

Contents

1 Background

1.1 Military situation

1.2 Union attempts against Richmond

1.3 Shakeup in the Army of the Potomac

1.4 Intelligence and plans

1.5 Initial movements

1.5.1 April 27–30: Movement to battle

2 Opposing forces

2.1 Union

2.2 Confederate

3 Battle

3.1 May 1: Hooker passes on opportunity

3.2 May 2: Jackson's flank attack

3.3 May 3: Chancellorsville

3.4 May 3: Fredericksburg and Salem Church

3.5 May 4–6: Union withdrawals

4 Aftermath

4.1 Casualties

4.2 Assessment of Hooker

4.3 Union reaction

4.4 Confederate reaction

5 Additional battle maps

5.1 Gallery: Chancellorsville campaign tactical maps

6 Battlefield preservation

7 In popular media

8 See also

9 Notes

10 References

10.1 Memoirs and primary sources

11 Further reading

12 External links

Background

Military situation

Main article: Eastern Theater of the American Civil War

Further information: Peninsula Campaign, Seven Days Battles, Northern Virginia campaign, Maryland campaign, Battle of Fredericksburg, and American Civil War

Union attempts against Richmond

In the Eastern Theater of the American Civil War, the objective of the Union had been to advance and seize the Confederate capital, Richmond, Virginia. In the first two years of the war, four major attempts had failed: the first foundered just miles away from Washington, D.C., at the First Battle of Bull Run (First Manassas) in July 1861. Maj. Gen. George B. McClellan's Peninsula Campaign took an amphibious approach, landing his Army of the Potomac on the Virginia Peninsula in the spring of 1862 and coming within 6 miles (9.7 km) of Richmond before being turned back by Gen. Robert E. Lee in the Seven Days Battles.[14]

That summer, Maj. Gen. John Pope's Army of Virginia was defeated at the Second Battle of Bull Run. In December 1862, Maj. Gen. Ambrose Burnside commanded the Army of the Potomac and attempted to reach Richmond by way of Fredericksburg, Virginia, where he was defeated at the Battle of Fredericksburg. This string of Union defeats was interrupted in September 1862 when Lee moved into Maryland and his campaign was turned back by McClellan at the Battle of Antietam, but this represented no threat to Richmond.[15]

Shakeup in the Army of the Potomac

In January 1863, the Army of the Potomac, following the Battle of Fredericksburg and the humiliating Mud March, suffered from rising desertions and plunging morale. Maj. Gen. Ambrose Burnside decided to conduct a mass purge of the Army of the Potomac's leadership, eliminating a number of generals who he felt were responsible for the disaster at Fredericksburg. In reality, he had no power to dismiss anyone without the approval of Congress.[16]

Predictably, Burnside's purge went nowhere, and he offered President Abraham Lincoln his resignation from command of the Army of the Potomac. He even offered to resign entirely from the Army, but the president persuaded him to stay, transferring him to the Western Theater, where he became commander of the Department of the Ohio. Burnside's former command, the IX Corps, was transferred to the Virginia Peninsula, a movement that prompted the Confederates to detach troops from Lee's army under Lt. Gen. James Longstreet, a decision that would be consequential in the upcoming campaign.[17]

Abraham Lincoln had become convinced that the appropriate objective for his Eastern army was the army of Robert E. Lee, not any geographic features such as a capital city,[18] but he and his generals knew that the most reliable way to bring Lee to a decisive battle was to threaten his capital. Lincoln tried a fifth time with a new general on January 25, 1863—Maj. Gen. Joseph Hooker, a man with a pugnacious reputation who had performed well in previous subordinate commands.[19]

With Burnside's departure, Maj. Gen. William B. Franklin left as well. Franklin had been a staunch supporter of George B. McClellan and refused to serve under Hooker, because he disliked him personally and also because he was senior to Hooker in rank. Maj. Gen. Edwin V. Sumner stepped down due to old age (he was 65) and poor health. He was reassigned to a command in Missouri, but died before he could assume it. Brig. Gen. Daniel Butterfield was reassigned from command of the V Corps to be Hooker's chief of staff.[20]

Hooker embarked on a much-needed reorganization of the army, doing away with Burnside's grand division system, which had proved unwieldy; he also no longer had sufficient senior officers on hand that he could trust to command multi-corps operations.[21] He organized the cavalry into a separate corps under the command of Brig. Gen. George Stoneman (who had commanded the III Corps at Fredericksburg). But while he concentrated the cavalry into a single organization, he dispersed his artillery battalions to the control of the infantry division commanders, removing the coordinating influence of the army's artillery chief, Brig. Gen. Henry J. Hunt.[22]

Hooker established a reputation as an outstanding administrator and restored the morale of his soldiers, which had plummeted to a new low under Burnside. Among his changes were fixes to the daily diet of the troops, camp sanitary changes, improvements and accountability of the quartermaster system, addition of and monitoring of company cooks, several hospital reforms, an improved furlough system, orders to stem rising desertion, improved drills, and stronger officer training.[23]

Intelligence and plans

My plans are perfect. May God have mercy on General Lee for I will have none.

Maj. Gen. Joseph Hooker[24]

Hooker took advantage of improved military intelligence about the positioning and capabilities of the opposing army, superior to that available to his predecessors in army command. His chief of staff, Butterfield, commissioned Col. George H. Sharpe from the 120th New York Infantry to organize a new Bureau of Military Information in the Army of the Potomac, part of the provost marshal function under Brig. Gen. Marsena R. Patrick. Previously, intelligence gatherers, such as Allan Pinkerton and his detective agency, gathered information only by interrogating prisoners, deserters, "contrabands" (slaves), and refugees.[25]

The new BMI added other sources including infantry and cavalry reconnaissance, spies, scouts, signal stations, and an aerial balloon corps. As he received the more complete information correlated from these additional sources, Hooker realized that if he were to avoid the bloodbath of direct frontal attacks, which were features of the battles of Antietam and, more recently, Fredericksburg, he could not succeed in his crossing of the Rappahannock "except by stratagem."[26]

Hooker's plan for the Chancellorsville campaign

  Confederate

  Union

Hooker's army faced Lee across the Rappahannock from its winter quarters in Falmouth and around Fredericksburg. Hooker developed a strategy that was, on paper, superior to those of his predecessors. He planned to send his 10,000 cavalrymen under Maj. Gen. George Stoneman to cross the Rappahannock far upstream and raid deep into the Confederate rear areas, destroying crucial supply depots along the railroad from the Confederate capital in Richmond to Fredericksburg, which would cut Lee's lines of communication and supply.[27]

Hooker reasoned that Lee would react to this threat by abandoning his fortified positions on the Rappahannock and withdrawing toward his capital. At that time, Hooker's infantry would cross the Rappahannock in pursuit, attacking Lee when he was moving and vulnerable. Stoneman attempted to execute this turning movement on April 13, but heavy rains made the river crossing site at Sulphur Spring impassable. President Lincoln lamented, "I greatly fear it is another failure already." Hooker was forced to create a new plan for a meeting with Lincoln, Secretary of War Edwin M. Stanton, and general in chief Henry W. Halleck in Aquia on April 19.[28]

Troops crossing the Rapidan at Germanna Ford

Hooker's second plan was to launch both his cavalry and infantry simultaneously in a bold double envelopment of Lee's army. Stoneman's cavalry would make a second attempt at its deep strategic raid, but at the same time, 42,000 men in three corps (V, XI, XII Corps) would stealthily march to cross the Rappahannock upriver at Kelly's Ford. They would then proceed south and cross the Rapidan at Germanna and Ely's Ford, concentrate at the Chancellorsville crossroads, and attack Lee's army from the west.[29]

While they were under way, 10,000 men in two divisions from the II Corps would cross at the U.S. Ford and join with the V Corps in pushing the Confederates away from the river. The second half of the double envelopment was to come from the east: 40,000 men in two corps (I and VI Corps, under the overall command of John Sedgwick) would cross the Rappahannock below Fredericksburg and threaten to attack Stonewall Jackson's position on the Confederate right flank.[30]

The remaining 25,000 men (III Corps and one division of the II Corps) would remain visible in their camps at Falmouth to divert Confederate attention from the turning movement. Hooker anticipated that Lee would either be forced to retreat, in which case he would be vigorously pursued, or he would be forced to attack the Union Army on unfavorable terrain.[31]

One of the defining characteristics of the battlefield was a dense woodland south of the Rapidan known locally as the "Wilderness of Spotsylvania". The area had once been an open broadleaf forest, but during colonial times the trees were gradually cut down to make charcoal for local pig iron furnaces. When the supply of wood was exhausted, the furnaces were abandoned and secondary forest growth developed, creating a dense mass of brambles, thickets, vines, and low-lying vegetation.[32]

Catharine Furnace, abandoned in the 1840s, had recently been reactivated to produce iron for the Confederate war effort. This area was largely unsuitable for the deployment of artillery and the control of large infantry formations, which would nullify some of the Union advantage in military power. It was important for Hooker's plan that his men move quickly out of this area and attack Lee in the open ground to the east. There were three primary roads available for this west-to-east movement: the Orange Plank Road, the Orange Turnpike, and the River Road.[33]

The Confederate dispositions were as follows: the Rappahannock line at Fredericksburg was occupied by Longstreet's First Corps division of Lafayette McLaws on Marye's Heights, with Jackson's entire Second Corps to their right. Early's division was at Prospect Hill and the divisions of Rodes, Hill, and Colston extended the Confederate right flank along the river almost to Skinker's Neck. The other division present from Longstreet's Corps, Anderson's, guarded the river crossings on the left flank. Stuart's cavalry was largely in Culpeper County near Kelly's Ford, beyond the infantry's left flank.[34]

Initial movements

April 27–30: Movement to battle

Battle of Chancellorsville, Situation Late 30 April 1863 and Movements since 27 April

On April 27–28, the initial three corps of the Army of the Potomac began their march under the leadership of Slocum. They crossed the Rappahannock and Rapidan rivers as planned and began to concentrate on April 30 around the hamlet of Chancellorsville, which was little more than a single large, brick mansion at the junction of the Orange Turnpike and Orange Plank Road. Built in the early 19th century, it had been used as an inn on the turnpike for many years, but now served as a home for the Frances Chancellor family. Some of the family remained in the house during the battle.[35]

Hooker arrived late in the afternoon on April 30 and made the mansion his headquarters. Stoneman's cavalry began on April 30 its second attempt to reach Lee's rear areas. Two divisions of II Corps crossed at U.S. Ford on April 30 without opposition. By dawn on April 29, pontoon bridges spanned the Rappahannock south of Fredericksburg and Sedgwick's force began to cross.[36]

Pleased with the success of the operation so far, and realizing that the Confederates were not vigorously opposing the river crossings, Hooker ordered Sickles to begin the movement of the III Corps from Falmouth the night of April 30 – May 1. By May 1, Hooker had approximately 70,000 men concentrated in and around Chancellorsville.[37]

Troops on Hooker's right cross the Rappahannock

In his Fredericksburg headquarters, Lee was initially in the dark about the Union intentions and he suspected that the main column under Slocum was heading towards Gordonsville. Jeb Stuart's cavalry was cut off at first by Stoneman's departure on April 30, but they were soon able to move freely around the army's flanks on their reconnaissance missions after almost all their Union counterparts had left the area.[38]

As Stuart's intelligence information about the Union river crossings began to arrive, Lee did not react as Hooker had anticipated. He decided to violate one of the generally accepted principles of war and divide his force in the face of a superior enemy, hoping that aggressive action would allow him to attack and defeat a portion of Hooker's army before it could be fully concentrated against him. He became convinced that Sedgwick's force would demonstrate against him, but not become a serious threat, so he ordered about 4/5 of his army to meet the challenge from Chancellorsville. He left behind a brigade under Brig. Gen. William Barksdale on heavily fortified Marye's Heights behind Fredericksburg and one division under Maj. Gen. Jubal A. Early, on Prospect Hill south of the town.[39]

These roughly 11,000 men and 56 guns would attempt to resist any advance by Sedgwick's 40,000. He ordered Stonewall Jackson to march west and link up with Maj. Gen. Richard H. Anderson's division, which had pulled back from the river crossings they were guarding and began digging earthworks on a north-south line between the Zoan and Tabernacle churches. McLaws's division was ordered from Fredericksburg to join Anderson. This would amass 40,000 men to confront Hooker's movement east from Chancellorsville. Heavy fog along the Rappahannock masked some of these westward movements and Sedgwick chose to wait until he could determine the enemy's intentions.[40]

Opposing forces

Union

Further information: Union order of battle and Detailed Union strength

Key commanders (Army of the Potomac)

Maj. Gen.

Joseph Hooker,

(Commanding)

 

Maj. Gen.

John F. Reynolds,

I Corps

 

Maj. Gen.

Darius N. Couch,

II Corps

 

Maj. Gen.

Daniel E. Sickles,

III Corps

 

Maj. Gen.

George G. Meade,

V Corps

 

Maj. Gen.

John Sedgwick,

VI Corps

 

Maj. Gen.

Oliver O. Howard,

XI Corps

 

Maj. Gen.

Henry W. Slocum,

XII Corps

 

Maj. Gen.

George Stoneman,

Cav. Corps

The Army of the Potomac,[4] commanded by Maj. Gen. Joseph Hooker, had 133,868 men[7][8] and 413 guns[7][41] organized as follows:[42]

I Corps, commanded by Maj. Gen. John F. Reynolds, with the divisions of Brig. Gens. James S. Wadsworth, John C. Robinson, and Abner Doubleday.

II Corps, commanded by Maj. Gen. Darius N. Couch, with the divisions of Maj. Gen. Winfield Scott Hancock and William H. French, and Brig. Gen. John Gibbon.

III Corps, commanded by Maj. Gen. Daniel E. Sickles, with the divisions of Brig. Gen. David B. Birney, and Maj. Gens. Hiram G. Berry and Amiel W. Whipple.

V Corps, commanded by Maj. Gen. George G. Meade, with the divisions of Brig. Gens. Charles Griffin and Andrew A. Humphreys, and Maj. Gen. George Sykes.

VI Corps, commanded by Maj. Gen. John Sedgwick, with the divisions of Brig. Gens. William T. H. Brooks and Albion P. Howe, Maj. Gen. John Newton, and Col. Hiram Burnham.

XI Corps, commanded by Maj. Gen. Oliver O. Howard, with the divisions of Brig. Gen. Charles Devens, Jr., and Adolph von Steinwehr, and Maj. Gen. Carl Schurz.

XII Corps, commanded by Maj. Gen. Henry W. Slocum, with the divisions of Brig. Gens. Alpheus S. Williams and John W. Geary.

Cavalry Corps, commanded by Maj. Gen. George Stoneman, with the divisions of Brig. Gens. Alfred Pleasonton, William W. Averell, and David M. Gregg.

Confederate

Further information: Confederate order of battle and Detailed Confederate strength: part 1, part 2, part 3

Key commanders (Army of Northern Virginia)

Gen.

Robert E. Lee,

(Commanding)

 

Lt. Gen.

James Longstreet,

I Corps

 

Lt. Gen.

Stonewall Jackson,

II Corps

 

Maj. Gen.

J.E.B. Stuart,

Cav. Corps

Gen. Robert E. Lee's Army of Northern Virginia[6] fielded 60,298 men[8][9] and 220 guns,[43] organized as follows:[44]

First Corps, commanded by Lt. Gen. James Longstreet. Longstreet and the majority of his corps (the divisions of Maj. Gen. John Bell Hood and Maj. Gen. George E. Pickett, and two artillery battalions) were detached for duty in southeastern Virginia. The divisions present at Chancellorsville were those of Maj. Gens. Lafayette McLaws and Richard H. Anderson.

Second Corps, commanded by Lt. Gen. Stonewall Jackson, with the divisions of Maj. Gen. A.P. Hill, Brig. Gen. Robert E. Rodes, Maj. Gen. Jubal A. Early, and Brig. Gen. Raleigh E. Colston.

Cavalry Corps, commanded by Maj. Gen. J.E.B. Stuart. (Stuart's corps had only two brigades at Chancellorsville, those of Brig. Gens. Fitzhugh Lee and W.H.F. "Rooney" Lee. The brigades of Brig. Gens. Wade Hampton and William E. "Grumble" Jones were detached.)

The Chancellorsville campaign was one of the most lopsided clashes of the war, with the Union's effective fighting force more than twice the Confederates', the greatest imbalance during the war in Virginia. Hooker's army was much better supplied and was well-rested after several months of inactivity. Lee's forces, on the other hand, were poorly provisioned and were scattered all over the state of Virginia. Some 15,000 men of Longstreet's Corps had previously been detached and stationed near Norfolk in order to block a potential threat to Richmond from Federal troops stationed at Fort Monroe and Newport News on the Peninsula, as well as at Norfolk and Suffolk.[45]

In light of the continued Federal inactivity, by late March Longstreet's primary assignment became that of requisitioning provisions for Lee's forces from the farmers and planters of North Carolina and Virginia. As a result of this the two divisions of Maj. Gen. John Bell Hood and Maj. Gen. George Pickett were 130 miles (210 km) away from Lee's army and would take a week or more of marching to reach it in an emergency. After nearly a year of campaigning, allowing these troops to slip away from his immediate control was Lee's gravest miscalculation. Although he hoped to be able to call on them, these men would not arrive in time to aid his outnumbered forces.[46]

Battle

May 1: Hooker passes on opportunity

Chancellorsville, actions on May 1

Jackson's men began marching west to join with Anderson before dawn on May 1. Jackson himself met with Anderson near Zoan Church at 8 a.m., finding that McLaws's division had already arrived to join the defensive position. But Stonewall Jackson was not in a defensive mood. He ordered an advance at 11 a.m. along two roads toward Chancellorsville: McLaws's division and the brigade of Brig. Gen. William Mahone on the Turnpike, and Anderson's other brigades and Jackson's arriving units on the Plank Road.[47]

At about the same time, Hooker ordered his men to advance on three roads to the east: two divisions of Meade's V Corps (Griffin and Humphreys) on the River Road to uncover Banks's Ford, and the remaining division (Sykes) on the Turnpike; and Slocum's XII Corps on the Plank Road, with Howard's XI Corps in close support. Couch's II Corps was placed in reserve, where it would be soon joined by Sickles's III Corps.[48]

The first shots of the Battle of Chancellorsville were fired at 11:20 a.m. as the armies collided. McLaws's initial attack pushed back Sykes's division. The Union general organized a counterattack that recovered the lost ground. Anderson then sent a brigade under Brig. Gen. Ambrose Wright up an unfinished railroad south of the Plank Road, around the right flank of Slocum's corps. This would normally be a serious problem, but Howard's XI Corps was advancing from the rear and could deal with Wright.[49]

Sykes's division had proceeded farther forward than Slocum on his right, leaving him in an exposed position. This forced him to conduct an orderly withdrawal at 2 p.m. to take up a position behind Hancock's division of the II Corps, which was ordered by Hooker to advance and help repulse the Confederate attack. Meade's other two divisions made good progress on the River Road and were approaching their objective, Banks's Ford.[50]

Modern attempts to rehabilitate and fumigate Joe Hooker's reputation usually and remarkably employ special pleading about the difficulties of moving in the Wilderness. Such arguments actually emphasize the salient factor on May 1: Getting out of that wilderness of course was the very essence of the general's needs. When he abandoned the chance to reach that desirable goal, Hooker at once passed the initiative, with all of its advantages, to Lee. The Confederate would make superb use of the opportunity.

Robert K. Krick, Lee's Greatest Victory[51]

Despite being in a potentially favorable situation, Hooker halted his brief offensive. His actions may have demonstrated his lack of confidence in handling the complex actions of such a large organization for the first time (he had been an effective and aggressive division and corps commander in previous battles), but he had also decided before beginning the campaign that he would fight the battle defensively, forcing Lee, with his small army, to attack his own, larger one. At the [First] Battle of Fredericksburg (December 13, 1862), the Union army had done the attacking and met with a bloody defeat.[52]

Hooker knew Lee could not sustain such a defeat and keep an effective army in the field, so he ordered his men to withdraw back into the Wilderness and take a defensive position around Chancellorsville, daring Lee to attack him or retreat with superior forces at his back. He confused matters by issuing a second order to his subordinates to hold their positions until 5 p.m., but by the time it was received, most of the Union units had begun their rearward movements. That evening, Hooker sent a message to his corps commanders, "The major general commanding trusts that a suspension in the attack to-day will embolden the enemy to attack him."[53]

The retrograde movement had prepared me for something of the kind, but to hear from [Hooker's] own lips that the advantages gained by the successful marches of his lieutenants were to culminate in fighting a defensive battle in that nest of thickets was too much, and I retired from his presence with the belief that my commanding general was a whipped man.

Union Maj. Gen. Darius N. Couch[54]

Hooker's subordinates were surprised and outraged by the change in plans. They saw that the position they were fighting for near the Zoan Church was relatively high ground and offered an opportunity for the infantry and artillery to deploy outside the constraints of the Wilderness. Meade exclaimed, "My God, if we can't hold the top of the hill, we certainly can't hold the bottom of it!" Viewing through the lens of hindsight, some of the participants and many modern historians judged that Hooker effectively lost the campaign on May 1. Stephen W. Sears observed, however, that Hooker's concern was based on more than personal timidity.[55]

The ground being disputed was little more than a clearing in the Wilderness, to which access was available by only two narrow roads. The Confederate response had swiftly concentrated the aggressive Stonewall Jackson's corps against his advancing columns such that the Federal army was outnumbered in that area, about 48,000 to 30,000, and would have difficulty maneuvering into effective lines of battle. Meade's two divisions on the River Road were too far separated to support Slocum and Sykes, and reinforcements from the rest of the II Corps and the III Corps would be too slow in arriving.[56]

As the Union troops dug in around Chancellorsville that night, creating log breastworks, faced with abatis, Lee and Stonewall Jackson met at the intersection of the Plank Road and the Furnace Road to plan their next move. Jackson believed that Hooker would retreat across the Rappahannock, but Lee assumed that the Union general had invested too much in the campaign to withdraw so precipitously. If the Federal troops were still in position on May 2, Lee would attack them. As they discussed their options, cavalry commander J.E.B. Stuart arrived with an intelligence report from his subordinate, Brig. Gen. Fitzhugh Lee.[57]

Although Hooker's left flank was firmly anchored by Meade's V Corps on the Rappahannock, and his center was strongly fortified, his right flank was "in the air." Howard's XI Corps was camped on the Orange Turnpike, extending past Wilderness Church, and was vulnerable to a flanking attack. Investigations of a route to be used to reach the flank identified the proprietor of Catharine Furnace, Charles C. Wellford, who showed Jackson's cartographer, Jedediah Hotchkiss, a recently constructed road through the forest that would shield marchers from the observation of Union pickets. Lee directed Jackson to make the flanking march, a maneuver similar to the one that had been so successful prior to the Second Battle of Bull Run (Second Manassas). An account by Hotchkiss recalls that Lee asked Jackson how many men he would take on the flanking march and Jackson replied, "my whole command."[58]

May 2: Jackson's flank attack

Battle of Chancellorsville, 1 May 1863 (Situation at Dark)

Chancellorsville, actions on May 2

Battle of Chancellorsville, 2 May 1863 (Situation at 1800)

The ruins of Catharine Furnace photographed in 2011

The site of "Keenan's Charge" [8th Pennsylvania Cavalry Regiment] 2 May 1863

Dowdall's Tavern was Union General Oliver O. Howard's headquarters until he was surprised and driven out by Stonewall Jackson's Confederate troops on May 2.

Wilderness Church at Chancellorsville was the center of a stand made by Union general Schurz's division during Stonewall Jackson's surprise flank attack.

Early on the morning of May 2, Hooker began to realize that Lee's actions on May 1 had not been constrained by the threat of Sedgwick's force at Fredericksburg, so no further deception was needed on that front. He decided to summon the I Corps of Maj. Gen. John F. Reynolds to reinforce his lines at Chancellorsville. His intent was that Reynolds would form up to the right of the XI Corps and anchor the Union right flank on the Rapidan River.[59]

Given the communications chaos of May 1, Hooker was under the mistaken impression that Sedgwick had withdrawn back across the Rappahannock and, based on this, that the VI Corps should remain on the north bank of the river across from the town, where it could protect the army's supplies and supply line. In fact, both Reynolds and Sedgwick were still west of the Rappahannock, south of the town.[60]

Hooker sent his orders at 1:55 a.m., expecting that Reynolds would be able to start marching before daylight, but problems with his telegraph communications delayed the order to Fredericksburg until just before sunrise. Reynolds was forced to make a risky daylight march. By the afternoon of May 2, when Hooker expected him to be digging in on the Union right at Chancellorsville, Reynolds was still marching to the Rappahannock.[61]

Meanwhile, for the second time, Lee was dividing his army. Jackson would lead his Second Corps of 28,000 men around to attack the Union right flank while Lee exercised personal command of the remaining two divisions, about 13,000 men and 24 guns facing the 70,000 Union troops at Chancellorsville. For the plan to work, several things had to happen. First, Jackson had to make a 12-mile (19 km) march via roundabout roads to reach the Union right, and he had to do it undetected. Second, Hooker had to stay tamely on the defensive. Third, Early would have to keep Sedgwick bottled up at Fredericksburg, despite the four-to-one Union advantage there. And when Jackson launched his attack, he had to hope that the Union forces were unprepared.[62]

Confederate cavalry under Stuart kept most Union forces from spotting Jackson on his long flank march, which started between 7 and 8 a.m. and lasted until midafternoon. Several Confederate soldiers saw the Union observation balloon Eagle soaring overhead and assumed that they could likewise be seen, but no such report was sent to headquarters. When men of the III Corps spotted a Confederate column moving through the woods, their division commander, Brig. Gen. David B. Birney, ordered his artillery to open fire, but this proved little more than harassment. The corps commander, Sickles, rode to Hazel Grove to see for himself and he reported after the battle that his men observed the Confederates passing for over three hours.[63]

When Hooker received the report about the Confederate movement, he thought that Lee might be starting a retreat, but he also realized that a flanking march might be in progress. He took two actions. First, he sent a message at 9:30 a.m. to the commander of the XI Corps, Maj. Gen. Oliver O. Howard on his right flank: "We have good reason to suppose the enemy is moving to our right. Please advance your pickets for purposes of observation as far as may be safe in order to obtain timely information of their approach."[64]

At 10:50 a.m., Howard replied that he was "taking measures to resist an attack from the west." Hooker's second action was to send orders to Sedgwick - "attack the enemy in his front" at Fredericksburg if "an opportunity presents itself with a reasonable expectation of success" - and Sickles - "advance cautiously toward the road followed by the enemy, and harass the movement as much as possible". Sedgwick did not take action from the discretionary orders. Sickles, however, was enthusiastic when he received the order at noon. He sent Birney's division, flanked by two battalions of Col. Hiram Berdan's U.S. sharpshooters, south from Hazel Grove with orders to pierce the column and gain possession of the road.[65]

But the action came too late. Jackson had ordered the 23rd Georgia Infantry to guard the rear of the column and they resisted the advance of Birney and Berdan at Catherine Furnace. The Georgians were driven south and made a stand at the same unfinished railroad bed used by Wright's Brigade the day before. They were overwhelmed by 5 p.m. and most were captured. Two brigades from A.P. Hill's division turned back from the flanking march and prevented any further damage to Jackson's column, which by now had left the area.[66]

Most of Jackson's men were unaware of the small action at the rear of their column. As they marched north on Brock Road, Jackson was prepared to turn right on the Orange Plank Road, from which his men would attack the Union lines at around Wilderness Church. However, it became apparent that this direction would lead to essentially a frontal assault against Howard's line. Fitzhugh Lee met Jackson and they ascended a hill with a sweeping view of the Union position. Jackson was delighted to see that Howard's men were resting, unaware of the impending Confederate threat.[67]

Although by now it was 3 p.m., Jackson decided to march his men two miles farther and turn right on the Turnpike instead, allowing him to strike the unprotected flank directly. The attack formation consisted of two lines—the divisions of Brig. Gens. Robert E. Rodes and Raleigh E. Colston—stretching almost a mile on either side of the turnpike, separated by 200 yards, followed by a partial line with the arriving division of A.P. Hill.[68]

Ruins of the Chancellor House which was the headquarters of Federal General Joseph Hooker of the Army of the Potomac during the battle, later burned, May 1863

Significant contributions to the impending Union disaster were the nature of the Union XI Corps and the incompetent performance of its commander, Maj. Gen. Oliver O. Howard. Howard failed to make any provision for defending against a surprise attack, even though Hooker had ordered him to do so. The Union right flank was not anchored on any natural obstacle, and the only defenses against a flank attack consisted of two cannons pointing out into the Wilderness.[69]

Also, the XI Corps was not well respected – an outfit with poor morale and no history of battlefield success. Many of its officers and enlisted men were immigrants from Germany and other parts of Central Europe, including a number of political refugees from the 1848 revolutions. The corps had been formed in the spring of 1862 by merging Brig. Gen Louis Blenker's division with Maj. Gen John C. Frémont's Mountain Department in West Virginia. After a miserable trek across Virginia in which Blenker's troops were provisioned inadequately and suffered from widespread hunger, disease, and desertion, they joined with Fremont in a campaign that resulted in them being soundly defeated by Stonewall Jackson.[70]

Fremont's army became part of Maj. Gen John Pope's Army of Virginia in the summer. Fremont had refused to serve under Pope and was replaced by Maj. Gen Franz Sigel, an inept political general who, however, was much beloved by his German troops. Louis Blenker fell from a horse during the northern Virginia campaign and suffered injuries that would claim his life later in 1863. The corps suffered heavy casualties at Second Bull Run and was left behind in Washington D.C. during the Maryland campaign. During the Fredericksburg campaign, it did not join the rest of the army until after the battle was over.[71]

After Hooker took command, Sigel was the ranking general behind him. The XI Corps was the smallest in the army and Sigel's requests to general-in-chief Henry Halleck to have it enlarged were refused, so he resigned his command in March 1863 and was replaced by Maj. Gen Oliver O. Howard, who was widely unpopular with the enlisted men and brought in several new generals such as Brig. Gen Francis Barlow who had a reputation of being aggressive martinets. Eight of the 27 regiments in the corps had never been in battle before, while the remaining 21 had never been on the winning side of a battle. The German soldiers suffered from widespread ethnic friction with the rest of the army although a number of the regiments in the XI Corps consisted of native-born Americans.[72]

Hooker had no major plans for the corps except for mopping up after the main battle was over, and it was placed out on the army's right flank where it was not expected to be involved in any fighting, and the woods to the west were assumed to be so thick that enemy troops could not possibly move through them and form a line of battle. As far as Hooker knew, the only possible route for a Confederate attack was along the turnpike, which would cause them to run right into the II and XII Corps, both elite outfits and well-entrenched. Further north, the Union line was held by the V Corps, also first-rate troops occupying an almost impregnable position.[73]

As the day wore on, the men of the XI Corps became increasingly aware that something was going on in the woods to the west of them, but were unable to get any higher-ups to pay attention. Col. John C. Lee of the 55th Ohio received numerous reports of a Confederate presence out there, and Col. William Richardson of the 25th Ohio reported that huge numbers of Confederates were massing to the west. Col. Leopold von Gilsa, who commanded one of two brigades in Brig. Gen Charles Devens' division, went to Howard's headquarters warning him that an all-out enemy assault was imminent, but Howard insisted that it was impossible for the Confederates to get through the dense woods.

Maj. Gen Carl Schurz, who commanded the 3rd Division of the corps, began rearranging his troops into a line of battle. Captain Hubert Dilger, who commanded Battery I of the 1st Ohio Artillery, rode out on a reconnaissance mission, narrowly missed being captured by the Confederates, and rode far north, almost to the banks of the Rapidan, and back south to Hooker's headquarters, but a haughty cavalry officer dismissed his concerns and would not let him in to see the general. Dilger next went to Howard's headquarters, but was merely told that the Confederate army was retreating and that it was not acceptable to make scouting expeditions without permission of higher-ups. As the sun started to go down, all remained quiet on the XI Corps's front, the noises of the III and XII Corps engaging Lee's rear guard coming from off in the distance.

The XI Corps routs before Jackson's evening dinner time surprise attack

Around 5:30 p.m.,[74]Jackson turned to Robert Rodes and asked him "General, are you ready?" When Rodes nodded, Jackson replied "You may go forward then."[75] Most of the men of the XI Corps were encamped and sitting down for supper and had their rifles unloaded and stacked. Their first clue to the impending onslaught was the observation of numerous animals, such as rabbits and foxes, fleeing in their direction out of the western woods. This was followed by the crackle of musket fire, and then the unmistakable scream of the "Rebel Yell".

Two of von Gilsa's regiments, the 153rd Pennsylvania and 54th New York, had been placed up as a heavy skirmish line and the massive Confederate assault rolled completely over them. A few men managed to get off a shot or two before fleeing. The pair of artillery pieces at the very end of the XI Corps line were captured by the Confederates and promptly turned on their former owners. Devens's division collapsed in a matter of minutes, slammed on three sides by almost 30,000 Confederates. Col. Robert Reily and his 75th Ohio managed to resist for about ten minutes before the regiment disintegrated with 150 casualties, including Reily himself, and joined the rest of the fleeing mob.

Col. Lee would later write sarcastically, "A rifle pit is useless when the enemy is on the same side and in rear of your line." Some men tried to stand and resist, but they were knocked over by their fleeing comrades and a hail of Confederate bullets. Maj. Gen. Carl Schurz ordered his division to shift from an east-west alignment to north-south, which they did with amazing precision and speed. They resisted for about 20 minutes and "Leatherbreeches" Dilger managed to drive the Confederates off the turnpike for a bit with his guns, but the sheer weight of Jackson's assault overwhelmed them, too, and they soon had to flee.

Dilger for a time stood alone with a gun firing double-shotted canister at the attackers, then limbered up to flee as the Confederates closed in on him. Three of his artillery horses were shot dead, and when he realized that the gun could not be moved, he had to abandon it. General Howard partially redeemed his inadequate performance prior to the battle by his personal bravery in attempting to rally the troops. He stood shouting and waving a flag held under the stump of his amputated arm lost at the Battle of Seven Pines in 1862, ignoring the danger of the heavy rifle fire, but he could only gather small pockets of soldiers to resist before his corps disintegrated. Col. Adolf Buschbeck's brigade put up a last-ditch stand along with Dilger's guns. They too had to retreat, but maintained good order as they went.

The chaos unfurling on the Union right had gone unnoticed at Hooker's headquarters until at last the sound of gunfire could be heard in the distance, followed by a panic-stricken mob of men and horses pouring into the Chancellorsville clearing. A staff officer yelled "My God, here they come!" as the mob ran to and past the Chancellor mansion. Hooker jumped onto his horse and frantically tried to take action. He ordered Maj. Gen Hiram Berry's division of the III Corps, once his own division, forward, yelling "Receive them on your bayonets!" Artillerymen around the clearing began moving guns into position around Fairview Cemetery.[76]

Meanwhile, down at Hazel Grove, the 8th Pennsylvania Cavalry were relaxing and awaiting orders to chase after Confederate wagon trains, also oblivious to the collapse of the XI Corps. The regiment's commander, Maj. Pennock Huey, received a notice that General Howard was requesting some cavalry. Huey saddled up his men and headed west along the turnpike, where they ran straight into Robert Rodes's division. After a confused fight, the 8th Pennsylvania Cavalry retreated to the safety of the Chancellorsville clearing with the loss of 30 men and three officers.[77]

XII Corps artillery halts Jackson's surprise attack

Lower right photograph of trees shattered by artillery shells near where Jackson was shot on the Orange Plank Road.

By nightfall, the Confederate Second Corps had advanced more than 1.25 miles, to within sight of Chancellorsville, but darkness and confusion were taking their toll. The attackers were almost as disorganized as the routed defenders. Although the XI Corps had been defeated, it had retained some coherence as a unit. The corps suffered nearly 2,500 casualties (259 killed, 1,173 wounded, and 994 missing or captured), about one quarter of its strength, including 12 of 23 regimental commanders, which suggests that they fought fiercely during their retreat.[78]

Jackson's force was now separated from Lee's men only by Sickles's corps, which had been separated from the main body of the army after its foray attacking Jackson's column earlier in the afternoon. Like everyone else in the Union army, the III Corps had been unaware of Jackson's attack. When he first heard the news, Sickles was skeptical, but finally believed it and decided to pull back to Hazel Grove.[79]

Sickles became increasingly nervous, knowing that his troops were facing an unknown number of Confederates to the west. A patrol of Jackson's troops was driven back by Union gunners, a minor incident that would come to be exaggerated into a heroic repulse of Jackson's entire command. Between 11 p.m. and midnight, Sickles organized an assault north from Hazel Grove toward the Plank Road, but called it off when his men began suffering artillery and rifle friendly fire from the Union XII Corps.[80]

Stonewall Jackson wanted to press his advantage before Hooker and his army could regain their bearings and plan a counterattack, which might still succeed because of the sheer disparity in numbers. He rode out onto the Plank Road that night to determine the feasibility of a night attack by the light of the full moon, traveling beyond the farthest advance of his men. When one of his staff officers warned him about the dangerous position, Jackson replied, "The danger is all over. The enemy is routed. Go back and tell A.P. Hill to press right on."

As he and his staff started to return, they were incorrectly identified as Union cavalry by men of the 18th North Carolina Infantry, who hit Jackson with friendly fire. Jackson's three bullet wounds were not in themselves life-threatening, but his left arm was broken and had to be amputated. While recovering, he contracted pneumonia and died on May 10. His death was a devastating loss for the Confederacy. Some historians and participants—particularly those of the postbellum Lost Cause movement—attribute the Confederate defeat at Gettysburg two months later to Jackson's absence.

The Union gunners at Fairview Cemetery were alert and nervous; they were a few hundred yards behind Berry's division and still-intact elements of the XI Corps and they found it quite impossible to fire their guns without the shells going over the heads of the infantrymen in front of them. A few friendly-fire casualties resulted from this as the gunners were quick to shoot at anything that looked like enemy soldiers; when they got sight of a large body of Confederates drawing near, they let loose a huge cannonade that landed on and around the party that was carrying the wounded Jackson to the rear and did end up wounding A.P. Hill.[81]

May 3: Chancellorsville

Chancellorsville, actions on May 3, dawn to 10 a.m.

Battle of Chancellorsville, 3 May 1863 (Situation Early)

Despite the fame of Stonewall Jackson's victory on May 2, it did not result in a significant military advantage for the Army of Northern Virginia. Howard's XI Corps had been defeated, but the Army of the Potomac remained a potent force and Reynolds's I Corps had arrived overnight, which replaced Howard's losses. About 76,000 Union men faced 43,000 Confederate at the Chancellorsville front. The two halves of Lee's army at Chancellorsville were separated by Sickles's III Corps, which occupied a strong position on high ground at Hazel Grove.[82]

Unless Lee could devise a plan to eject Sickles from Hazel Grove and combine the two halves of his army, he would have little chance of success in assaulting the formidable Union earthworks around Chancellorsville. Fortunately for Lee, Joseph Hooker inadvertently cooperated. Early on May 3, Hooker ordered Sickles to move from Hazel Grove to a new position on the Plank Road. As they were withdrawing, the trailing elements of Sickles's corps were attacked by the Confederate brigade of Brig. Gen. James J. Archer, which captured about 100 prisoners and four cannons. Hazel Grove was soon turned into a powerful artillery platform with 30 guns under Col. Porter Alexander.[83]

After Jackson was wounded on May 2, command of the Second Corps fell to his senior division commander, Maj. Gen. A.P. Hill. Hill was soon wounded himself. He consulted with Brig. Gen. Robert E. Rodes, the next most senior general in the corps, and Rodes acquiesced in Hill's decision to summon Maj. Gen. J.E.B. Stuart to take command, notifying Lee after the fact. Brig. Gen. Henry Heth replaced Hill in division command.[84]

Although Stuart was a cavalryman who had never commanded infantry before, he was to deliver a creditable performance at Chancellorsville. By the morning of May 3, the Union line resembled a horseshoe. The center was held by the III, XII, and II Corps. On the left were the remnants of the XI Corps, and the right was held by the V and I Corps. On the western side of the Chancellorsville salient, Stuart organized his three divisions to straddle the Plank Road: Heth's in the advance, Colston's 300–500 yards behind, and Rodes's, whose men had done the hardest fighting on May 2, near the Wilderness Church.[85]

The attack began about 5:30 a.m. supported by the newly installed artillery at Hazel Grove, and by simultaneous attacks by the divisions of Anderson and McLaws from the south and southeast. The Confederates were resisted fiercely by the Union troops behind strong earthworks, and the fighting on May 3 was the heaviest of the campaign. The initial waves of assaults by Heth and Colston gained a little ground, but were beaten back by Union counterattacks.[86]

At Hazel Grove, in short, the finest artillerists of the Army of Northern Virginia were having their greatest day. They had improved guns, better ammunition and superior organization. With the fire of battle shining through his spectacles, William Pegram rejoiced. "A glorious day, Colonel," he said to Porter Alexander, "a glorious day!"

Douglas Southall Freeman, Lee's Lieutenants[87]

Rodes sent his men in last and this final push, along with the excellent performance of the Confederate artillery, carried the morning battle. Chancellorsville was the only occasion in the war in Virginia in which Confederate gunners held a decided advantage over their Federal counterparts. Confederate guns on Hazel Grove were joined by 20 more on the Plank Road to duel effectively with the Union guns on neighboring Fairview Hill, causing the Federals to withdraw as ammunition ran low and Confederate infantrymen picked off the gun crews.[88]

Fairview was evacuated at 9:30 a.m., briefly recaptured in a counterattack, but by 10 a.m. Hooker ordered it abandoned for good. The loss of this artillery platform doomed the Union position at the Chancellorsville crossroads as well, and the Army of the Potomac began a fighting retreat to positions circling United States Ford. The soldiers of the two halves of Lee's army reunited shortly after 10 a.m. before the Chancellor mansion, wildly triumphant as Lee arrived on Traveller to survey the scene of his victory.[89]

Lee's presence was the signal for one of those uncontrollable bursts of enthusiasm which none can appreciate who has not witnessed them. The fierce soldiers, with their faces blackened with the smoke of battle, the wounded crawling with feeble limbs from the fury of the devouring flames, all seemed possessed with a common impulse. One long unbroken cheer, in which the feeble cry of those who lay helpless on the earth blended with the strong voices of those who still fought, rose high above the roar of battle and hailed the presence of a victorious chief. He sat in the full realization of all that soldiers dream of—triumph; and as I looked at him in the complete fruition of the success which his genius, courage, and confidence in his army had won, I thought that it must have been from some such scene that men in ancient days ascended to the dignity of gods.

— Charles Marshall, Lee's military secretary, An Aide-de-Camp to Lee[90]

At the height of the fighting on May 3, Hooker suffered an injury when at 9:15 a.m. a Confederate cannonball hit a wooden pillar he was leaning against at his headquarters. He later wrote that half of the pillar "violently [struck me] ... in an erect position from my head to my feet." He likely received a concussion, which was sufficiently severe to render him unconscious for over an hour. Although clearly incapacitated after he arose, Hooker refused to turn over command temporarily to his second-in-command, Maj. Gen. Darius N. Couch, and, with Hooker's chief of staff, Maj. Gen. Daniel Butterfield, and Sedgwick out of communication (again due to the failure of the telegraph lines), there was no one at headquarters with sufficient rank or stature to convince Hooker otherwise. This failure may have affected Union performance over the next day and may have directly contributed to Hooker's seeming lack of nerve and timid performance throughout the rest of the battle.[91]

May 3: Fredericksburg and Salem Church

Further information: Second Battle of Fredericksburg and Battle of Salem Church

Soldiers of the VI Corps, Army of the Potomac, in trenches before storming Marye's Heights at the Second Battle of Fredericksburg during the Chancellorsville campaign, Virginia, May 1863. This photograph (Library of Congress #B-157) is sometimes mistakenly labeled as taken at the 1864 Siege of Petersburg, Virginia.

Chancellorsville, actions on May 3, 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., including the Second Battle of Fredericksburg and the Battle of Salem Church

Chancellorsville Campaign, 3 May 1863 (Battle of Salem Church: Situation at 1600)

As Lee was savoring his victory at the Chancellorsville crossroads, he received disturbing news: Maj. Gen. John Sedgwick's force had broken through the Confederate lines at Fredericksburg and was headed toward Chancellorsville. On the night of May 2, in the aftermath of Jackson's flank attack, Hooker had ordered Sedgwick to "cross the Rappahannock at Fredericksburg on the receipt of this order, and at once take up your line of march on the Chancellorsville road until you connect with him. You will attack and destroy any force you may fall in with on the road."[92]

Lee had left a relatively small force at Fredericksburg, ordering Brig. Gen. Jubal Early to "watch the enemy and try to hold him." If he was attacked in "overwhelming numbers," Early was to retreat to Richmond, but if Sedgwick withdrew from his front, he was to join with Lee at Chancellorsville. On the morning of May 2, Early received a garbled message from Lee's staff that caused him to start marching most of his men toward Chancellorsville, but he quickly returned after a warning from Brig. Gen. William Barksdale of a Union advance against Fredericksburg.[93]

At 7 a.m. on May 3, Early was confronted with four Union divisions: Brig. Gen. John Gibbon of the II Corps had crossed the Rappahannock north of town, and three divisions of Sedgwick's VI Corps—Maj. Gen. John Newton and Brig. Gens. Albion P. Howe and William T. H. Brooks—were arrayed in line from the front of the town to Deep Run. Most of Early's combat strength was deployed to the south of town, where Federal troops had achieved their most significant successes during the December battle. Marye's Heights was defended by Barksdale's Mississippi brigade and Early ordered the Louisiana brigade of Brig. Gen. Harry T. Hays from the far right to Barksdale's left.[94]

By midmorning, two Union attacks against the infamous stone wall on Marye's Heights were repulsed with numerous casualties. A Union party under flag of truce was allowed to approach ostensibly to collect the wounded, but while close to the stone wall, they were able to observe how sparsely the Confederate line was manned. A third Union attack was successful in overrunning the Confederate position. Early was able to organize an effective fighting retreat.[95]

John Sedgwick's road to Chancellorsville was open, but he wasted time in gathering his troops and forming a marching column. His men, led by Brooks's division, followed by Newton and Howe, were delayed for several hours by successive actions against the Alabama brigade of Brig. Gen. Cadmus M. Wilcox. His final delaying line was a ridge at Salem church, where he was joined by three brigades from McLaws's division and one from Anderson's, bringing the total Confederate strength to about 10,000 men.[96]

Artillery fire was exchanged by both sides in the afternoon and at 5:30 p.m., two brigades of Brooks's division attacked on both sides of the Plank Road. The advance south of the road reached as far as the churchyard, but was driven back. The attack north of the road could not break the Confederate line. Wilcox described the action as "a bloody repulse to the enemy, rendering entirely useless to him his little success of the morning at Fredericksburg." Hooker expressed his disappointment in Sedgwick: "my object in ordering General Sedgwick forward ... Was to relieve me from the position in which I found myself at Chancellorsville. ... In my judgment General Sedgwick did not obey the spirit of my order, and made no sufficient effort to obey it. ... When he did move it was not with sufficient confidence or ability on his part to manoeuvre his troops."[97]

The fighting on May 3, 1863, was some of the most furious anywhere in the civil war. The loss of 21,357 men that day in the three battles, divided equally between the two armies, ranks the fighting only behind the Battle of Antietam as the bloodiest day of war in American history.[98]

May 4–6: Union withdrawals

Confederate dead behind the stone wall of Marye's Heights, Fredericksburg, Virginia, killed during the Chancellorsville campaign (the Second Battle of Fredericksburg), May 1863. Photograph by A.J. Russell.

Chancellorsville, actions on May 4, withdrawals on May 5 and 6

Battle of Chancellorsville, 4 May 1863 (Situation at 1800)

Battle of Chancellorsville, 6 May 1863 (Situation at 1700)

On the evening of May 3 and all day May 4, Hooker remained in his defenses north of Chancellorsville. Lee observed that Hooker was threatening no offensive action, so felt comfortable ordering Anderson's division to join the battle against Sedgwick. He sent orders to Early and McLaws to cooperate in a joint attack, but the orders reached his subordinates after dark, so the attack was planned for May 4.[99]

By this time Sedgwick had placed his divisions into a strong defensive position with its flanks anchored on the Rappahannock, three sides of a rectangle extending south of the Plank Road. Early's plan was to drive the Union troops off Marye's Heights and the other high ground west of Fredericksburg. Lee ordered McLaws to engage from the west "to prevent [the enemy] concentrating on General Early."[100]

Early reoccupied Marye's Heights on the morning of May 4, cutting Sedgwick off from the town. However, McLaws was reluctant to take any action. Before noon, Lee arrived with Anderson's division, giving him a total of 21,000 men, slightly outnumbering Sedgwick. Despite Lee's presence, McLaws continued his passive role and Anderson's men took a few hours to get into position, a situation that frustrated and angered both Early and Lee, who had been planning on a concentrated assault from three directions.[101]

The attack finally began around 6 p.m. Two of Early's brigades (under Brig. Gens. Harry T. Hays and Robert F. Hoke) pushed back Sedgwick's left-center across the Plank Road, but Anderson's effort was a slight one and McLaws once again contributed nothing. Throughout the day on May 4, Hooker provided no assistance or useful guidance to Sedgwick, and Sedgwick thought about little else than protecting his line of retreat.[102]

Sedgwick withdrew across the Rappahannock at Banks's Ford during the pre-dawn hours of May 5. When he learned that Sedgwick had retreated back over the river, Hooker felt he was out of options to save the campaign. He called a council of war and asked his corps commanders to vote about whether to stay and fight or to withdraw. Although a majority voted to fight, Hooker had had enough, and on the night of May 5–6, he withdrew back across the river at U.S. Ford.[103]

It was a difficult operation. Hooker and the artillery crossed first, followed by the infantry beginning at 6 a.m. on May 6. Meade's V Corps served as the rear guard. Rains caused the river to rise and threatened to break the pontoon bridges.[104]

Couch was in command on the south bank after Hooker departed, but he was left with explicit orders not to continue the battle, which he had been tempted to do. The surprise withdrawal frustrated Lee's plan for one final attack against Chancellorsville. He had issued orders for his artillery to bombard the Union line in preparation for another assault, but by the time they were ready Hooker and his men were gone.[105]

The Union cavalry under Brig. Gen. George Stoneman, after a week of ineffectual raiding in central and southern Virginia in which they failed to attack any of the objectives Hooker established, withdrew into Union lines east of Richmond—the peninsula north of the York River, across from Yorktown—on May 7, ending the campaign.[106]

Aftermath

My God! It is horrible—horrible; and to think of it, 130,000 magnificent soldiers so cut to pieces by less than 60,000 half-starved ragamuffins!

Horace Greeley, New York Tribune[107]

Casualties

Further information: Detailed Union casualties and Detailed Confederate casualties

Senior officer casualties

Maj. Gen.

Hiram G. Berry, killed

 

Brig. Gen.

Charles Devens, wounded

 

Brig. Gen.

Amiel W. Whipple, mortally wounded

 

Brig. Gen.

Gershom Mott, wounded

 

Brig. Gen.

William Hays, wounded

 

Lt. Gen.

Stonewall Jackson, mortally wounded

 

Maj. Gen.

Ambrose P. Hill, wounded

 

Brig. Gen.

Henry Heth, wounded

 

Brig. Gen.

William D. Pender, wounded

 

Brig. Gen.

Samuel McGowan, wounded

 

Brig. Gen.

Stephen D. Ramseur, wounded

 

Brig. Gen.

Robert F. Hoke, wounded

 

Brig. Gen.

Francis T. Nicholls, wounded

 

Brig. Gen.

Edward A. O'Neal, wounded

 

Brig. Gen.

Elisha F. Paxton, killed

 

Col.

Stapleton Crutchfield, wounded

Lee, despite being outnumbered by a ratio of over two to one, won arguably his greatest victory of the war, sometimes described as his "perfect battle."[108] But he paid a terrible price for it, taking more casualties than he had lost in any previous battle, including the Confederate defeat at the Battle of Antietam. With only 60,000 men engaged, he suffered 13,303 casualties (1,665 killed, 9,081 wounded, 2,018 missing),[11] losing some 22% of his force in the campaign—men that the Confederacy, with its limited manpower, could not replace. Just as seriously, he lost his most aggressive field commander, Stonewall Jackson. Brig. Gen. Elisha F. Paxton was the other Confederate general killed during the battle. After Longstreet rejoined the main army, he was highly critical of Lee's strategy, saying that battles like Chancellorsville cost the Confederacy more men than it could afford to lose.[109]

Of the 133,000 Union men engaged, 17,197 were casualties (1,606 killed, 9,672 wounded, 5,919 missing),[11] a percentage much lower than Lee's, particularly considering that it includes 4,000 men of the XI Corps who were captured on May 2. When comparing only the killed and wounded, there were almost no differences between the Confederate and Federal losses at Chancellorsville. The Union lost three generals in the campaign: Maj. Gens. Hiram G. Berry and Amiel W. Whipple and Brig. Gen. Edmund Kirby.[110]

Assessment of Hooker

Lee's Chancellorsville consisted of a pastiche of unbelievably risky gambits that led to a great triumph. Hooker's campaign, after the brilliant opening movements, degenerated into a tale of opportunities missed and troops underutilized.

Robert K. Krick, Lee's Greatest Victory[111]

Hooker, who began the campaign believing he had "80 chances in 100 to be successful", lost the battle through miscommunication, the incompetence of some of his leading generals (most notably Howard and Stoneman, but also Sedgwick), but mostly through the collapse of his own confidence. Hooker's errors included abandoning his offensive push on May 1 and ordering Sickles to give up Hazel Grove and pull back on May 2. He also erred in his disposition of forces; despite Abraham Lincoln's exhortation, "this time put in all your men," some 40,000 men of the Army of the Potomac scarcely fired a shot. When later asked why he had ordered a halt to his advance on May 1, Hooker is reputed to have responded, "For the first time, I lost faith in Hooker."[112] However, Stephen W. Sears has categorized this as a myth:

Nothing has been more damaging to General Joseph Hooker's military reputation than this, from John Bigelow's The Campaign of Chancellorsville (1910): "A couple of months later, when Hooker crossed the Rappahannock [actually, the Potomac] with the Army of the Potomac in the Campaign of Gettysburg he was asked by General Doubleday: 'Hooker, what was the matter with you at Chancellorsville? ... Hooker answered frankly ... 'Doubleday ... For once I lost confidence in Hooker'."[113]

Sears's research has shown that Bigelow was quoting from a letter written in 1903 by an E. P. Halstead, who was on the staff of Doubleday's I Corps division.[113] There is no evidence that Hooker and Doubleday ever met during the Gettysburg campaign, and they could not have done so since they were dozens of miles apart. Finally, Doubleday made no mention of such a confession from Hooker in his history of the Chancellorsville campaign, published in 1882.[114] Sears concludes:

It can only be concluded that forty years after the event, elderly ex-staff officer Halstead was at best retailing some vaguely remembered campfire tale, and at worst manufacturing a role for himself in histories of the campaign.... Whatever Joe Hooker's failings at Chancellorsville, he did not publicly confess them.[114]

Lincoln later told Connecticut Representative Deming that he believed the war could have been terminated at Chancellorsville had Hooker managed the battle better: specifically, "when Hooker failed to reinforce Sedgwick, after hearing his cannon...." However, he added, "I do not know that I could have given any different orders had I been with them myself. I have not fully made up my mind how I should behave when minie-balls were whistling, and those great oblong shells shrieking in my ear. I might run away."[115]

Union reaction

The Union was shocked by the defeat. President Abraham Lincoln was quoted as saying, "My God! My God! What will the country say?" A few generals were career casualties. Hooker relieved Stoneman for incompetence and for years waged a vituperative campaign against Howard, whom he blamed for his loss. He wrote in 1876 that Howard was "a hypocrite ... totally incompetent ... a perfect old woman ... a bad man." He labeled Sedgwick as "dilatory." Couch was so disgusted by Hooker's conduct of the battle (and his incessant political maneuvering) that he resigned and was placed in charge of the Department of the Susquehanna, commanding only Pennsylvania militia.[116]

President Lincoln chose to retain Hooker in command of the army, but the friction between Lincoln, general in chief Henry W. Halleck, and Hooker became intolerable in the early days of the Gettysburg campaign and Lincoln relieved Hooker of command on June 28, just before the Battle of Gettysburg. One of the consequences of Chancellorsville at Gettysburg was the conduct of Daniel Sickles, who undoubtedly recalled the terrible consequences of withdrawing from Hazel Grove when he decided to ignore the commands of his general and moved his lines on the second day of battle to ensure that a minor piece of high ground, the Peach Orchard, was not available to the enemy's artillery.[117]

Confederate reaction

The Confederate public had mixed feelings about the result, joy at Lee's tactical victory tempered by the loss of their most beloved general, Stonewall Jackson. The death of Jackson caused Lee to make the long-needed reorganization of the Army of Northern Virginia from two large corps into three, under James Longstreet, Richard S. Ewell, and A.P. Hill. The new assignments for the latter two generals caused some command difficulties in the upcoming Gettysburg campaign, which began in June. Of more consequence for Gettysburg, however, was the supreme confidence that Lee gained from his great victory at Chancellorsville, that his army was virtually invincible and would succeed at anything he asked them to do.[118]

Lee later wrote "At Chancellorsville we gained another victory; our people were wild with delight—I, on the contrary, was more depressed than after Fredericksburg; our loss was severe, and again we gained not an inch of ground and the enemy could not be pursued.”[119]

Additional battle maps

Gallery: Chancellorsville campaign tactical maps

Map symbols

 

Map 1:

Hooker's Flanking March, 27–30 April 1863

 

Map 2:

1 May 1863 (late morning)

 

Map 3:

2 May 1863 (early evening)

 

Map 4:

3 May 1863 (early morning)

 

Map 5:

4 May 1863 (late afternoon)

Battlefield preservation

Fredericksburg and Spotsylvania County Battlefields Memorial National Military Park

U.S. National Register of Historic Places

U.S. National Military Park

Virginia Landmarks Register

ChancellorsvilleBattlefieldModern.jpg

A piece of artillery.

Area 4,601.1 acres (1,862 ha)

NRHP reference No. 66000046[120]

VLR No. 111-0147

Significant dates

Added to NRHP October 15, 1966

Designated VLR January 16, 1973[121]

The battlefield was a scene of widespread destruction, covered with dead men and animals. The Chancellor family, whose house was destroyed during the battle, placed the entire 854-acre property for sale four months after the battle. A smaller version of the house was rebuilt using some of the original materials, which served as a landmark for many of the veteran reunions of the late 19th century. In 1927, the rebuilt house was destroyed by fire. That same year, the United States Congress authorized the Fredericksburg and Spotsylvania National Military Park, which preserves some of the land that saw fighting in the 1862 Battle of Fredericksburg, the Chancellorsville campaign, the Battle of the Wilderness, and the Battle of Spotsylvania Court House (the latter two being key battles in the 1864 Overland Campaign).[122]

In May 2002, a regional developer announced a plan to build 2,300 houses and 2,000,000 square feet of commercial space on the 790-acre Mullins Farm, site of the first day of fighting at the Battle of Chancellorsville. Soon thereafter, the Civil War Trust (now a division of the American Battlefield Trust) formed the Coalition to Save Chancellorsville, a network of national and local preservation groups that waged a vocal campaign against the development.[123]

For nearly a year, the Coalition mobilized local citizens, held candlelight vigils and hearings, and encouraged residents to become more involved in preservation. Public opinion polling conducted by the Coalition found that more than two-thirds of local residents opposed the development. The survey also found that 90 percent of local residents believed their county has a responsibility to protect Chancellorsville and other historic resources.[124]

As a result of these efforts, in March 2003 the Spotsylvania County Board of Supervisors denied the rezoning application that would have allowed for the development of the site. Immediately following the vote, the Civil War Trust and other Coalition members began working to acquire the battlefield. By working with county officials and developers, the Trust acquired 140 acres in 2004 and another 74 acres in 2006.[125]The Trust and its federal, state and local partners have acquired and preserved 1,288 acres (5.21 km2) of the battlefield in more than a dozen different transactions since 2002.[126]

In popular media

The battle formed the basis for Stephen Crane's 1895 novel The Red Badge of Courage.[127]

The battle serves as the background for one of F. Scott Fitzgerald's short stories, published in the February 1935 Esquire Magazine, entitled "The Night at Chancellorsville."[128]

The Battle of Chancellorsville was depicted in the 2003 film Gods and Generals, based on the novel of the same name. The treatment of the battle in both the novel and the movie focuses on Jackson's assault on the Union right flank, his wounding, and his subsequent death.

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