During the fiercest part of the battle, “Stonewall” Jackson was on the hill just on the Fredericksburg side of Hamilton’s Crossing where Walker’s artillery was posted, but toward evening, fired with his hope of driving the Union forces across the river, he rode rapidly from place to place, sending out frequent orders. One of these he gave to an aide.

“Captain, go through there and if you and your horse come out alive, tell Stuart I am going to advance my whole line at sunset.” It was this charge, mentioned above, which failed.

Late that night, rising from the blankets which he shared with a Chaplain, Jackson wrote some orders. While he was doing this, an orderly came and standing at the tent flap, said, “General Gregg is dying, General, and sent me to say to you that he wrote you a letter recently in which he used expressions he is sorry for. He says he meant no disrespect by that letter and was only doing what he thought was his duty. He hopes you will forgive him.”

Without hesitation, Jackson, who was deeply stirred, answered, “Tell General Gregg I will be with him directly.”

He rode through the woods back to where the brave Georgian was dying, and day was about to break when he came back to his troops.

General Maxey Gregg, of Georgia, was killed in action here, as were a number of other gallant officers.

Jackson held the right of the Confederate lines all day with 26,000 men against 55,000. His losses were about 3,415, while Hooker and Franklin lost 4,447. Meanwhile, against Marye’s Heights, the left center of the line, almost two miles away, General Burnside sent again and again terrific infantry charges.

The hills just back of Fredericksburg are fronted by an upward sloping plane, and at the foot of that part of the hills called Marye’s Heights is a stone wall and the “Sunken Road”—as fatal here for Burnside as was the Sunken Road at Waterloo for Napoleon. On Marye’s Heights was the Washington Artillery, and a number of guns—a veritable fortress, ready, as General Pegram said, “to sweep the plans in front as close as a fine-tooth comb.” At the foot of the heights behind the stone wall were Cobb’s Georgians, Kershaw’s South Carolinians, and Ransom’s and Cobb’s North Carolinas—nine thousand riflemen, six deep, firing over the front lines’ shoulders, so that, so one officer wrote “they literally sent bullets in sheets.”

Against this impregnable place, Burnside launched charge after charge, and never did men go more bravely and certainly to death. This was simultaneous with the fighting at Hamilton’s Crossing.

Meagher’s Irish Brigade went first across the plain. Detouring from Hanover street and George street, they formed line of battle on the lowest ground, and with cedar branches waving in their hats, bravely green in memory of “the ould sod” they swept forward until the rifles behind the wall and the cannon on the hill decimated their ranks; and yet again they formed and charged, until over the whole plain lay the dead, with green cedar boughs waving idly in their hats. The Irish Brigade was practically exterminated, and three more charges by larger bodies failed, although one Northern officer fell within twenty-five yards of the wall. The day ended in the utter defeat of the Union Army, which withdrew into Fredericksburg at night.

In front of the wall 8,217 Union soldiers were killed or wounded, and in the “Sunken Road” the Confederates lost 1,962.

The total Union loss in the whole battle of Fredericksburg was 12,664 and the Confederates’ loss 5,377.

General J. R. Cook, of the Confederate Army, was killed almost at the spot where Cobb fell. General C. F. Jackson and General Bayard, of the Union Army, were killed, the latter dying in the Bernard House, “Mansfield,” where Franklin had his headquarters.

General T. R. R. Cobb, the gallant commander of the Georgians, fell mortally wounded at the stone wall, and tradition has said that he was killed by a shell fired from the lawn of his mother’s home, a dramatic story that is refuted by evidence that he was killed by a sharpshooter in a house at the left and in front of the “Sunken Road.”

But the brilliant Georgian, who aided in formulating the Confederate Constitution, was killed within sight of the house, where, more than forty years before, the elder Cobb met, and in which he married, she who was to be the General’s mother. Journeying late in 1819 North to attend Congress, Senator John Forsythe, who was born in Fredericksburg, and Senator Cobb, Sr., were guests of Thomas R. Rootes, Esq., at Federal Hill, a great house that sits at the edge of the town, overlooking the little valley and Marye’s Heights, and there began a romance that led to marriage of Miss Rootes and Senator Cobb, in the mansion, in 1820. From the spot where he stood when he died, had not the smoke of a terrific battle screened it, their son, the Georgian General, could have clearly seen the windows of the room in which his parents were married.

General Cobb died in the yard of a small house, just at the edge of the “Sunken Road,” ministered to in his last moments, as was many another man who drank the last bitter cup that day, by an angel of mercy and a woman of dauntless courage, Mrs. Martha Stevens.

Her house was in the center of the fire, yet she refused to leave it, and there between the lines, with the charges rolling up to her yard fence and tons of lead shrieking about her, Mrs. Stevens stayed all day, giving the wounded drink, and bandaging their wounds until every sheet and piece of clothing in the house had been used to bind a soldier’s hurts. At times the fire of Northern troops was concentrated on her house so that General Lee, frowning, turned to those about him and said: “I wish those people would let Mrs. Stevens alone.”

Nothing in the war was finer than the spirit of this woman, who stayed between the lines in and about her house, through the planks of which now and then a bullet splintered its way, miraculously living in a hail of missiles where, it seemed, nothing else could live.

During the battle at Fredericksburg, General Lee stood on “Lee’s Hill,” an eminence near Hazel Run, and between Marye’s Heights and Hamilton’s crossing. Looking across the Rappahannock he could see “Chatham,” the great winged brick house where General Burnside had headquarters, and where, under the wide spreading oaks, General Lee had won his bride, the pretty Mary Custis. The fine old place was now the property of Major Lacy, who rode up to Lee and said: “General there are a group of Yankee officers on my porch. I do not want my house spared. I ask permission to give orders to shell it.” General Lee, smiling, said: “Major, I do not want to shell your fine old house. Besides, it has tender memories for me. I courted my bride under its trees.”

In all this saturnalia of blood, it is a relief to find something in lighter vein, and in this case it is furnished by two Irishmen, Meagher and Mitchell. This little incident takes us back some years to “Ould Ireland.” Here three young Irishmen, Charles Francis Meagher, John Boyle O’Reily and John Mitchell, known respectively, as the Irish Orater, Poet and Patriot, fired by love for Free Ireland and Home Rule, earned exile for themselves and left Ireland hurriedly. O’Reily settled in Boston and became a well-known poet and a champion of the North. Meagher settled in New York, and at the outbreak of the War organized the Irish Brigade, of which he was made Brigadier-General. Mitchell settled in Richmond, where he became the editor of the Richmond Enquirer, and, as a spectator, stood on Marye’s Heights during the battle and witnessed the desperate charges and bloody repulses of his old friend, Meagher; and as he watched he unburdened his soul. His refrain varied between exultation at the sight of a fine fight and execration, in picturesque and satisfying language, of the “renegade Irishman,” his one-time friend, who would fight against the very principle, the advocacy of which had brought them exile from Ireland.

Marye’s Heights; The Stone Wall
It was Here that the Terrible and Spectacular Charges Spent Themselves.
The Sunken Road is in the Foreground

Mitchell’s grandson was John Purroy Mitchell, mayor of New York City, who died in the Aviation service during the late war.

There was another soul at the Battle of Fredericksburg whose spirit of mercy to the suffering was stronger than the dread of death, and in the Chapel of the Prince of Peace at Gettysburg, is a tablet to him, Dick Kirkland—the “Angel of Marye’s Heights”—a gracious memorial placed by the Federal survivors of that fight.

Dick Kirkland, a Southern soldier, who all day long had fought behind the Stone Wall, laid aside all animosity when night fell and the bitter cries arose in the chill air from the wounded and dying on the plain. The pitiful calls for “water, water” so moved the young South Carolinian that he asked his commanding officer to be allowed to relieve the sufferers. His request was at first refused, but when he begged, permission was given, and taking as many full canteens as he could carry, he went out among the pitiful forms dotting the field, while the shells and rifle fire still made it most dangerous, administering to the enemy. He was a good Samaritan and unafraid, who is affectionately remembered by a grateful foe. Kirkland was more merciful to the wounded Federals than was their commander, for it was forty-eight hours before General Burnside could swallow his pride and acknowledge defeat by applying for a truce. In the interval, during forty-eight hours of winter weather while the wounded lay unsheltered, chill winds sweeping over them, the wailing and the agonized crying slowly died out. Every wounded man who could not crawl or walk died, and when the truce came more than four thousand bodies were piled in front of the “Sunken Road.”

At night of December 13th, Burnside was utterly defeated and after quietly facing the Southern forces all day on the 14th, he was practically forced to abandon his battle plans by the protests of his Generals, who practically refused to charge again, and moved his army across the river at night.

In the whole action at Fredericksburg, General Lee used but 57,000 men, while official reports state that the Northern forces “in the fight” numbered 100,000. As bearing on this (and most assuredly with no intention to belittle the gallant men of the Federal Army, who fought so bravely) the condition of Burnside’s Army, due to the policy of his government and to Major-General Hooker’s insubordination, is to be considered. An estimate of this army by the New York Times shows to what pass vacillation had brought it. The Times said after Fredericksburg:

“Sad, sad it is to look at this superb Army of the Potomac—the match of which no conqueror ever led—this incomparable army, fit to perform the mission the country has imposed upon it—paralyzed, petrified, put under a blight and a spell. You see men who tell you that they have been in a dozen battles and have been licked and chased every time—they would like to chase once to see how it “feels.” This begins to tell on them. Their splendid qualities, their patience, faith, hope and courage, are gradually oozing out. Certainly never were a graver, gloomier, more sober, sombre, serious and unmusical body of men than the Army of the Potomac at the present time.”

On the other hand, thus spoke the correspondent of the London Times of the “tatterdermalion regiments of the South”:

“It is a strange thing to look at these men, so ragged, slovenly, sleeveless, without a superfluous ounce of flesh on their bones, with wild, matted hair, in mendicants rags, and to think, when the battle flags go to the front, how they can and do fight. ‘There is only one attitude in which I should never be ashamed of you seeing my men, and that is when they are fighting.’ These were General Lee’s words to me the first time I ever saw him.”

At Chancellorsville

From the close of the battle at Fredericksburg in December 1862, until the spring of 1863, General Burnside’s Army of the Potomac and General Lee’s Army of Northern Virginia lay in camp; the first on the north and the second on the south bank of the Rappahannock. The little town, now fairly well repopulated by returned refugees, lay between the hosts. The Northern lines practically began at Falmouth, where General Daniel Butterfield had headquarters, and at which spot young Count Zeppelin and his assistants were busily arranging to send up a great Observation Balloon with a signalling outfit. Southward, Lee’s army stretched over thirty-three miles, from the fords of the Rappahannock, where the hard riding cavalrymen of Stuart and W. H. F. Lee watched, to Port Royal, Jackson’s right.

Burnside’s headquarters were the Phillips house and Chatham, (recently owned by the famous journalist, Mark Sullivan and where he and Mrs. Sullivan made their home for some years). Hooker, part of the time, was at the Phillips house, Lee in a tent, near Fredericksburg, while General Jackson had headquarters first in an outbuilding at Moss Neck, now the home of Count d’Adhemar and later in a tent. It was here that he became fond of little Farley Carbin, who came every day to perch on his knee and receive little presents from him. One day he had nothing to give her, and so, ere she left, he tore the gold braid from the new hat that was part of a handsome uniform just given him by General “Jeb” Stuart, and placed it like a garland on her pretty curly head. During the winter the General, who from the beginning of the war never slept at night outside his army’s camp, nor had an hour’s leave of absence, saw for the first time since he left Lexington, and for next to the last time on earth, his wife and little daughter, whom he so fervently loved. They spent some weeks near him at Moss Neck.

Christmas Eve came. In the Southern camp back of the hills down the river road, up towards Banks Ford, out at Salem Church, and even in the town, hunger and cold were the lot of all. General Lee, wincing at the sufferings of his “tatterdermalion” forces, wrote and asked that the rations of his men be increased, but a doctor-inspector sent out by the often futile Confederate Government reported that the bacon ration of Lee’s army—one-half a pound a day, might be cut down, as “the men can be kept alive on this.” General Lee himself wrote that his soldiers were eating berries, leaves, roots and the bark of trees to “supplement the ration,” and although at this time the Confederate Government had a store of bacon and corn meal that would have fed all its armies a half year, Lee’s ragged soldiers starved throughout the winter. It is worthy of note here that when Lee’s starving army moved, foodless, toward that last day at Appomattox, they marched past 50,000 pounds of bacon alone, which the Confederate commissary, at Mr. Jefferson Davis’ orders, burned next day.

We spoke of Christmas Eve, when in the long lines of the two camps’ great fires beamed, voices rose in songs and hymns, and bands played. Late in the evening, when dusk had settled, a band near Brompton broke out defiantly into “Dixie,” and from the Washington Farm a big band roared out “The Battle Hymn.” There was a pause and then, almost simultaneously, they began “Home, Sweet Home,” and catching the time played it through together. When it was done, up from the camps of these boys who were to kill and be killed, who were to die in misery on many a sodden field, rose a wild cheer.

Hardly could two great armies ever before have lain for months’ within sight of each other as these two did in almost amicable relations. There was no firing; the cannon-crowned hills were silent. Drills and great reviews took place on either bank of the river and in the Confederate ranks there went on a great religious “revival” that swept through the organization. Along the banks of the river where pickets; patrolled by day, and their little fires flamed in the night, trading was active. From the Union bank would come the call softly:

They traded coffee, tobacco, newspapers and provisions, sometimes wading out and meeting in mid-river, but as the industry grew, miniature ferry lines, operated by strings, began to ply.

Soldiers and Generals passed and repassed in the streets of Fredericksburg, where wreckage still lay about in confusion, houses presented dilapidated fronts, and only a few of the citizens attempted to occupy their homes.

Once, in midwinter, the armies became active when Burnside attempted to move his army and cross the river above Fredericksburg; but only for a few days, for that unfortunate General’s plans were ruined by a deluge and his army “stuck in the mud.” General Hooker took his place.

About April 26 Hooker’s great army, “The finest army on the planet,” he bombastically called it, moved up the river and began crossing. It was his purpose to get behind Lee’s lines, surprise him and defeat him from the rear. On April twenty-ninth and thirtieth, Hooker got in position around Chancellorsville, in strong entrenchments, a part of his army amounting to 85,000 men, but the Confederate skirmishers were already in front of him.

It was the Northern Commander’s plan for Sedgwick, left at Fredericksburg with 40,000, to drive past Fredericksburg and on to Chancellorsville, and thus to place the Southern forces between the two big Federal armies and crush it.

Before the great battle of Chancellorsville began, this message came down from the first balloon ever successfully used in war, tugging at its cable two thousand feet above the Scott house, on Falmouth Heights:

But the force did not “remain as heretofore” long, though the tents were left to confuse the enemy, for on April 29 General Anderson moved to Chancellorsville, followed on April 30 by General McLaws; and under cover of darkness “Stonewall Jackson” moved to the same place that night, with 26,000 men. On May 1, then, Hooker’s 91,000 at Chancellorsville were being pressed by Lee’s army of 46,000.

General Early’s command of 9,000 and Barksdale’s brigade of 1,000 and some detached troops were left to defend Fredericksburg against Sedgwick’s corps, which was now crossing the Rappahannock, 30,000 strong. At 11 A. M., May 1, General Lee’s army, with Jackson’s corps on his left, began the attack at Chancellorsville, of which this dispatch speaks:

Before evening of May 1 Hooker’s advance guard was driven back, and the Confederate forces swept on until within one mile of Chancellorsville, and there, stopped by a “position of great natural strength” (General Lee) and by deep entrenchments, log breastworks and felled trees, they ceased to progress. It was evident at nightfall that with his inferior force the Southern commander could not drive Hooker, and that if he failed to do so, Sedgwick would drive back the small force in Fredericksburg and would come on from Fredericksburg and crush him.

Jackson and Lee bivouaced that night near where the Old Plank Road and the Furnace Road intersect, and here formulated their plans for the morrow. From Captain Murray Taylor, of General A. P. Hill’s staff, they learned that a road existed, by advancing down which (the Furnace Road) then turning sharply and marching in a “V” Jackson’s plan to turn Hooker’s right might be carried out, and at Captain Taylor’s suggestion they sent for “Jack” Hayden, who could not be gotten at once, and who, being an old man, was “hiding out” to avoid “Yankee” marauders.

Lee and Jackson slept on the ground. Jackson, over whom an officer had thrown his overcoat, despite his protests, waited until the officer dozed, gently laid the coat over him and slept uncovered, as he had not brought his own overcoat. Later, arising chilled, he sat by the fire until near dawn, when his army got in motion.

When Jackson moved away in the early hours of May 2 there were left to face Hooker’s 91,000 men on the Federal left, Lee’s 14,000 men, attacking and feinting, and nowhere else a man. Jackson was moving through tangled forests, over unused roads, and before 5 o’clock of that memorable afternoon of May 2 he had performed the never-equalled feat of moving an army, infantry and artillery of 26,000 men sixteen miles, entirely around the enemy, and reversing his own army’s front. He was now across the Plank Road and the Turnpike, about four miles from Chancellorsville, facing toward Lee’s line, six miles away. And Hooker was between them!

It was 5:30 when Jackson’s command (Colston’s and Rhodes’ Divisions, with A. P. Hill in reserve) gave forth the rebel yell and sweeping along through the woods parallel to the roads, fell on Hooker’s right while the unsuspecting army was at supper. The Federals fled in utter disorder.

Before his victorious command, Jackson drove Hooker’s army through the dark pine thickets until the Federal left had fallen on Chancellorsville and the right wing was piled up and the wagon trains fleeing, throwing the whole retreating army into confusion. At 9 o’clock he held some of the roads in Hooker’s rear, and the Northern army was in his grasp.

Hill was to go forward now. He rode to the front with his staff, a short distance behind Jackson, who went a hundred yards ahead of the Confederate lines on the turnpike to investigate. Bullets suddenly came singing from the Northern lines and Jackson turned and rode back to his own lines. Suddenly a Confederate picket shouted “Yankee cavalry,” as he rode through the trees along the edge of the Plank Road. Then a volley from somewhere in Lane’s North Carolina ranks poured out, and three bullets struck Jackson in the hand and arms. His horse bolted, but was stopped and turned, and Jackson was aided by General Hill to dismount. Almost all of Hill’s staff were killed or wounded.

There was trouble getting a litter, and the wounded man tried to walk, leaning on Major Leigh and Lieutenant James Power Smith. The road was filled with men, wounded, retreating, lost from their commands. Hill’s lines were forming for a charge and from these Jackson hid his face—they must not know he was wounded. A litter was brought and they bore the sufferer through the thickets until a fusilade passed about them and struck down a litter-bearer, so that the General was thrown from the litter his crushed shoulder striking a pine stump, and now for the first time, and last time, he groaned. Again they bore him along the Plank Road until a gun loaded with canister swept that road clear, and the litter-bearers fled, leaving General Jackson lying in the road. And here, with infinite heroism, Lieutenant Smith (see sketch of life) and Major Leigh lay with their bodies over him to shield him from missiles.

Where “Stonewall Jackson” Died
In the Room on the Lower Floor, the Window of Which Looks Out on the Little Bush,
The South’s Hero Passed Away

Later the wounded officer was gotten to a field headquarters near Wilderness Run, and Dr. Hunter McGuire and assistants amputated one arm and bound the other arm and hand. Two days later he was removed to Mr. Chandler’s home, near Guineas, where, refusing to enter the mansion because he feared his presence might bring trouble on the occupants should the Federals come, and because the house was crowded with other wounded, he was placed in a small outbuilding, which stands today. The record of his battle against death in this little cabin, his marvelous trust in God and his uncomplaining days of suffering until he opened his lips to feebly say: “Let us pass over the river and rest under the shade of the trees” is a beautiful story in itself. He died from pneumonia, which developed when his wounds were beginning to heal. The wounds only would not have killed him and the pneumonia probably resulted from sleeping uncovered on the night before referred to. Mrs. Jackson and their little child, Dr. Hunter McGuire, Lieutenant James Power Smith, his aide-de-camp; Mrs. Beasley and a negro servant were those closest to him in his dying hours.

Hill succeeded Jackson, and in twenty minutes was wounded and Stuart succeeded him, and fighting ceased for the night.

On May 3, General Lee attacked again, uniting his left wing with Stuart’s right, and a terrific battle took place that lasted all day, and at its end Hooker’s great army was defeated and dispirited, barely holding on in their third line trenches, close to the river; that worse did not befall him was due to events about Fredericksburg. (We may note here that Hooker lost at Chancellorsville 16,751 men while Lee lost about 11,000.)

For Sedgwick, with 30,000 men, took Marye’s Heights at 1 o’clock of this day, losing about 1,000 men, and immediately General Brooks’ division (10,000) marched out the Plank Road, where on each successive crest, Wilcox’s Alabamians, with a Virginia battery of two guns (4,000 in all) disputed the way. At Salem Church, General Wilcox planted his troops for a final stand.

Here at Salem Church the battle began when Sedgwick’s advance guard, beating its way all day against a handful of Confederates, finally formed late in the afternoon of May 3, prepared to throw their column in a grand assault against the few Confederates standing sullenly on the pine ridge which crosses the Plank Road at right angles about where Salem Church stands. Less than 4,000 Alabama troops, under General Wilcox, held the line, and against these General Brooks, of Sedgwick’s corps, threw his 10,000 men. They rushed across the slopes, met in the thicket, and here they fought desperately for an hour. Reinforcements reached the Confederates at sundown, and next morning General Lee had come with Anderson’s and McLaw’s commands, and met nearly the whole of Sedgwick’s command, charging them late in the afternoon of May 4, and driving them so that, before daybreak, they had retreated across the river. Then, turning back to attack Hooker, he found the latter also crossing the river.

Unique in the history of battles are the two monuments which stand near Salem Church, erected by the State of New Jersey and gallantly uttering praise of friend and foe.

They mark the farthest advance of the New Jersey troops. The first, on the right of the Plank Road as one goes from Fredericksburg to Chancellorsville, is a monument to the Fifteenth New Jersey troops, and on one side is inscribed:

The other monument stands on the ridge at Salem Church, close to the road, and about where the charge of the Twenty-third New Jersey shattered itself against the thin lines of Wilcox’s Alabamians. It stands just where these two bodies of troops fought hand to hand amidst a rolling fire of musketry, bathing the ground in blood. In the end the Confederates prevailed, but when the State of New Jersey erected the monument they did not forget their foe. It is the only monument on a battlefield that pays homage alike to friend and enemy.

The monument was unveiled in 1907, Governor E. Bird Gubb, who led the Twenty-third New Jersey, being the principal speaker. Thousands were present at the ceremonies.

On one side of the splendid granite shaft is a tablet, on which is engraved:

And on the other side another tablet is inscribed:

Two Great Battles

After Chancellorsville, the Confederate Army invaded the North, and Hooker left the Stafford Hills to follow Lee into Pennsylvania. When Gettysburg was over, both armies came back to face each other along the Rappahannock, twenty to thirty miles above Fredericksburg.

Now, Chancellorsville is in a quiet tract of scrub pine woods, twelve miles west of Fredericksburg. The Plank Road and the Turnpike run toward it and meet there, only to diverge three miles or so west, and six miles still further west (from Chancellorsville) the two roads cross Wilderness Run—the Turnpike crosses near Wilderness Tavern, the Plank Road about five miles southward.

Two miles from Wilderness Tavern on the Turnpike is Mine Run. Here General Meade, now commanding the Northern Army, moved his forces, and on December 1, 1863, the two armies were entrenched. But after skirmishes, Meade, who had started toward Richmond, decided not to fight and retreated with the loss of 1,000 men.

In the spring General Grant, now commander-in-chief, began to move from the vicinity of Warrenton, and on May 4, 1864, his vast army was treading the shadowed roads through the Wilderness. It was one of the greatest armies that has ever been engaged in mobile warfare; for, by official records, Grant had 141,000 men.

Lee’s army—he had now 64,000 men—was moving in three columns from the general direction of Culpeper.

Grant intended to get between Lee and Richmond, but he failed, for the Confederate commander met him in the tangled Wilderness, and one of the most costly battles of the war began—a battle than can barely be touched on here, for, fought as it was in the woods, the lines wavering and shifting and the attack now from one side, now from the other, it became so involved that a volume is needed to tell the story.

It is sufficient to say that the first heavy fighting began along the Turnpike near Wilderness Run, on May 4 and 5, and that shortly afterwards the lines were heavily engaged on each side of, and parallel to, the Plank Road. Northward, on the Germanna road, charges and countercharges were made, and on May 6, Sedgwick’s line finally broke and gave ground before a spirited charge by part of Ewell’s corps—the brigades of Gordon, Johnston and Pegram doubling up that flank.

The Northern left (on the Plank Road), which had been driven back once, rallied on the morning of May 6, and in a counter-attack threatened disaster to the Confederates under Heth and Wilcox who (this was in the forenoon) were driven back by a terrific charge from the Federal lines near Brock Road. Expected for hours, Longstreet’s march-worn men came up at this critical moment along Plank Road. Heading this column that had been moving since midnight was a brigade of Texans and toward these General Lee rode, calling:

The first answer was simply:

“My brave Texas boys, you must charge. You must drive those people back,” the Confederate commander said, so earnestly that the Texas troops began to form while Lee personally rallied the men who by now were pouring back from the front. Then as Longstreet’s men began to go forward Lee rode with them until the line paused while the cry arose from all directions “General Lee, go to the rear. Lee to the rear.” Officers seized his bridle. “If you will go to the rear, General,” said an officer waving his hand toward the lines “these men will drive ‘those people’ back.” His promise was made good, for as Lee drew back, Longstreet’s men—General Longstreet himself had now reached the head of the column—rushed through the woods, driving the advancing Federals back, and piercing their lines in two places. Before a second and heavier assault the whole line fell back to entrenchments in front of Brock Road, and soon the junction of that road and Plank Road was within Longstreet’s reach, and the Northern line threatened with irretrievable disaster.

And now, for the second time, just as a great victory was at hand, the Southern troops shot their leader. General Longstreet was advancing along the Plank Road with General Jenkins, at the head of the latter’s troops, when—mistaken for a body of the enemy—they were fired into. General Longstreet was seriously wounded, General Jenkins killed, and the forward movement was checked for several hours, during which the Federals reinforced the defenses at the junction.

At night of May 6 Grant had been defeated of his purpose, his army driven back over a mile along a front of four miles, and terrific losses inflicted—for he lost in the Wilderness 17,666 men, while the Confederate losses were 10,641. General Hays (Federal) was killed near the junction of Plank and Brock Roads.

Fire now raged through the tangled pines and out of the smoke through the long night came the screams of the wounded, who helplessly waited the coming of the agonizing flames. Thousands of mutilated men lay there for hours and hours feeling the heated breath of that which was coming to devour them, helpless to move, while the fire swept on through the underbrush and dead leaves.

The battle had no result. Grant was badly defeated, but, unlike Burnside, Hooker and Meade, he did not retreat across the Rappahannock. Instead, pursuing his policy and figuring that 140,000 men against 60,000 men could fight until they killed the 60,000, themselves loosing two to one, and still have 20,000 left, he moved “by the flank.”

By the morning of May 8 Grant’s army, moving by the rear, was reaching Spotsylvania Court House by the Brock Road and the Chancellorsville Road. General Lee has no road to move on. But on the night of May 7 his engineers cut one through the Wilderness to Shady Grove Church and his advance guard moving over this intercepted Warren’s corps two miles from the Court House and halted the advance. By the night of May 8, Lee’s whole army was in a semi-circle, five or six miles in length, about the Court House. The center faced northward and crossed the Fredericksburg Road.

Grant attacked feebly on May 10, and again on May 11, and because of the lightness of these attacks Lee believed Grant would again move “by the flank” toward Richmond. But before dawn on May 12 Hancock’s corps struck the apex of a salient just beyond the Court House, breaking the lines and capturing General Edward Johnson and staff and 1,200 men.

In this salient, now known as the “Bloody Angle,” occurred one of the most terrible hand-to-hand conflicts of modern warfare. From dawn to dawn, in the area of some 500 acres which the deep and well-fortified trenches of the angle enclosed, more than 60,000 men fought that day. Artillery could hardly be used, because of the mixture of the lines, but nowhere in the war was such rifle fire known. The Northern forces broke the left of the salient, took part of the right, and, already having the apex, pushed their troops through. The lines swayed, advancing and retreating all day.

Toward evening the gallant Gordan advancing from base line of the Angle, with his whole command pouring in rifle fire, but mostly using the bayonet, drove back the Federals slowly, and at night the Confederates held all except the apex. But General Lee abandoned the salient after dark, and put his whole force in the base line. Here General Grant hesitated to attack him.

All along the lines about Spotsylvania desperate fighting occurred that day, but the battle was distinctly a draw. Both armies lay in their trenches, now and then skirmishing, until May 18, when Grant withdrew, again moving “by the flank,” this time toward Milford, on the R., F. & P. Railroad.

Near the Bloody Angle, on the Brock Road, where it is intersected by a cross road, General Sedgwick was killed by a sharpshooter concealed in a tree. He fell from his horse, and although his aides summoned medical help he died almost immediately. The tree from which it is said the sharpshooter killed him is still standing.

General Lee had at Spotsylvania about 55,000 men and General Grant about 124,000.

The Federal loss was 15,577. The Confederate loss was 11,578. A large part of these, probably 15,000, fell in the Bloody Angle.[1]

In the War of 1812 only one company was formed here, commanded by Colonel Hamilton. This company did really very little service. The fear that the enemy would come up the Rappahannock River to attack this place was never realized.

In the war with Mexico it is not recorded that any distinctive company was enrolled here, although a number of its young men enlisted, and one of the Masons of Gunston was the first man killed, in the ambush of the First Dragoons on the Mexican border. General Daniel Ruggles won honor in this war.

In the Civil War, every man, “from the cradle to the grave,” went to the front voluntarily and cheerfully for the cause. They could be found in such commands as the Thirtieth Virginia Regiment of Infantry, commanded by Colonel Robert S. Chew, in which, among the many officers were: Hugh S. Doggett, Robert T. Know, James S. Knox, Edgar Crutchfield, John K. Anderson, Edward Hunter, Thomas F. Proctor and many others. Of these it is sufficient to say that at all times they loyally did their duty, and this may also be said of the Fredericksburg Artillery, sometimes called Braxton’s Battery, among the officers of which were Carter Braxton, Edward Marye, John Pollock, John Eustace and others. Some of “our boys” united themselves with the “Bloody Ninth” Virginia Cavalry, commanded by that prince of calvarimen, Colonel Thomas W. Waller, of Stafford. Others of the town, voluntarily enlisted in many other branches.

Charles T. Goolrick commanded a company of infantry which was organized and equipped by his father, Peter Goolrick. Later his health gave way and his brother, Robert Emmett Goolrick, a lieutenant in the company, took command.

When the War with Spain was declared, the old Washington Guards, which has done its duty at all times in the life of the town, came to the front. Captain Maurice B. Rowe was its commander at that time; Revere, first lieutenant, and Robert S. Knox, now of the U. S. Army, second lieutenant. It is pertinent to state that in the War with Spain there was no draft, and there were more volunteers than there was work to do. The company marched away with great hopes, but spent almost the whole period of the war at Camp Alger, near Washington.

When the Great World War came on, Fredericksburg sent two organized companies to the front. The first, the Washington Guards, under Captain Gunyon Harrison, and the second, the Coast Artillery Company, under Captain Johnson. No names can be recorded, for after the companies left, the draft men went in large bodies, and many won promotion and distinguished service medals.

On July 4, 1918, the town gave to the World War soldiers a sincere and royal “welcome home,” in which the people testified to their gratitude to them. In the war, our boys had added luster to the name of the town, and splendid credit to themselves. The joy of the occasion and the pleasure of it were marred by the fact that so many had died in France.

Heroes of Early Days