May 11, 1863, The Charleston Mercury
A week has passed since the defeat of HOOKER, and, as yet, no full or consecutive account of it has been obtained. The main facts, however, are now known. The Richmond Examiner thus briefly sketches the movements of the two armies:
Hooker’s first object in crossing the Rappahannock above the town was to get in the rear of Fredericksburg. His second aim was to prevent a flank attack on the left by the Confederates, who, he supposed, would march up the bank of the river to cut his army at the fords. Hence, he determined to cross the Rappahannock above the confluence with the Rapidan, to march through a portion of Culpeper, and passing the latter river at Germanna and Ely, to keep his communication behind him, the Rappahannock on his left flank, and the Confederate army and Fredericksburg always in front of him. On Tuesday week his troops were drawn up in full array on the hills of Stafford, in view of the town, pontoons were thrown over, and a strong detachment sent across at Deep Run. This first step was a mere feint to distract the attention. Next day his army disappeared, and the detachment was withdrawn, while the main body passed the rivers above in the order stated. Still believing that Lee’s onset would be made close to the river, and on his left flank, he rapidly strengthened that part of his line with field works, and then swung the rest forward to Chancellorsville.
It appears, however, from the despatches of the Confederate General, that his ways were not as the ways of Hooker, nor was his attack made in the manner which Hooker had decided he should make it. The Confederate operations were aimed at the right wing – that reaching to Spotsylvania Court House – of the Federals. General Jackson did flank them, after all, but it was the right flank – that nearest Richmond – not the left, which Hooker had carefully guarded with a river and field works. General Jackson appears to have turned the Yankee line somewhere beyond the Court House, and penetrating to the Wilderness, a creek between Culpeper and Spotsylvania, got partly in their rear. Attacked by the rest of the Confederates in front, while Jackson’s corps came down from the Wilderness, the finest army on the planet, commanded, though it was, by General Judas Hooker, was shortly defeated with great slaughter, dislodged from all the positions around Chancellorsville, doubled up on itself, and pressed down in confusion to the banks of the Rappahannock. In this condition their rout and annihilation were nearly certain, could the attack have been continued as commenced.
But the Confederate victory appears to have been marred by the news from Fredericksburg. A part of the army, supposed to have been sufficient, had been put to guard the old heights back of the town. Hooker had left a large force – said to have been two full corps – on the opposite hill, under an old regular officer, General Sedgwick. His important part in the play was to […..] pass the river and the crest,’ if possible, while Lee had his hands full of Hooker, and then rush upon his rear. After a long delay, he crossed the river, and did actually get possession of Marye’s Hill. Sedgwick was now in Lee’s rear, and the event might have been fatal to that General if Hooker had held his own in front. But Hooker was already beaten, and at that time helpless. Lee, therefore, could turn on Sedgwick with safety. He did so, whipped him at once, sent him back to Stafford, and reoccupied Fredericksburg. It is reported that he then went to finish Hooker.
It was too late! The Yankee General had gotten his beaten army in a very defensible position, supported by the Rapidan and Rappahannock, and had erected strong works in front. The Confederate General might well pause before he attacked him there without necessity.
Those who know the character of those rivers need not be told that there is no necessity to attack an army which depends on their fords for every particle of supply. It is possible to defend such a position as that which Hooker is said to have assumed; but impossible to remain in it. This is the season of heavy showers. One of these converts those streams in an hour from insignificant creeks into terrible torrents, which would sweep off Pharoah’s host. Hooker had the choice to come out and fight forward, or get back to the northern bank as soon as possible. As his army is a beaten army, we were not surprised to hear that he has chosen the latter alternative, and retreated while still able.
DETAILS OF THE BATTLE.
The correspondent of the Richmond Enquirer writes from Fredericksburg, May 6th, as follows:
The battle seems to be over, and from all I can gather a glorious victory has crowned the Confederate arms. I propose to give you a history of the whole fight, beginning with the crossing below town on Wednesday morning last and bringing it down to the brilliant charge of Monday evening, when the enemy were driven in confusion across the river, their midnight cry being’[…..] to Banks’ Ford.’
The first movement of the enemy, i.e. the crossing below town, can hardly be said to have been a feint. It would be perhaps more proper to speak of it as a movement designed to cooperate with the main attack at Chancellorsville, or it is possible that this force was left in front of Fredericksburg to prevent a rear movement on our part, which, if successful, and the river once crossed by our troops, at a point near town, their access to the railway could have been cut off and their base of supplies rendered useless to them. To guard his rear and protect his base, the force, which afterwards operated offensively, was at first intended to act defensively, in all probability.
How it afterwards acted on the offensive, and succeeded in carrying by storm ‘Marye’s Heights,’ can probably be explained by the fact that Hooker had been hard pressed and whipped in the fight of Saturday and Sunday morning at Chancellorsville, and made this in order to create a diversion, and enable him to cover his retreat.
Chancellorsville having been the real point of battle it will be most fitting to treat of its first. On Thursday evening Gen. Anderson, who was holding a position in front of the United States Mine Ford, twelve miles above Fredericksburg, ascertained that the Yankees, numbering five army corps, with at least eighty thousand men, crossed the Rapid Ann at Kelley and Germanna Fords, having previously crossed the North Fork of the Rappahannock at Easley’s Ford, in Culpeper county, and were advancing down the plank road. General Anderson at once fell back to Chancellorsville, and took up a line of battle in front of the plank road, and extending to the river, and reaching over towards the old Catherine Furnace. General Anderson, however, having too small a force to hold the enemy at this point, fell back to a position some four miles below Chancellorsville, and fronting the old mine road. On Friday morning General Anderson was reinforced on the right by General McLaws, and on the left by General A.P. Hill. At this period General Jackson took command, and ordered an advance, himself leading it, and succeeded during the day in driving the enemy back, they making but slight resistance. On Friday night our forces rested fully two miles beyond the ground occupied by the Yankee forces on the previous evening. The forces principally engaged thus far in this quarter, belonged to Semmes’ brigade of McLaws’ division, and Mahone’s brigade, of Anderson’s division.
Saturday morning wore away without important results. There was some artillery firing and a little skirmishing, but the engagement did not become general until about five o’clock in the afternoon, from which hour the fight raged furiously until about eight o’clock. Jackson, at this time, had thrown a force on their upper flank, and was driving them fiercely down upon our lower line, which, in turn, was hurling them back, and rendering futile all their efforts to break through our lower lines, and making it necessary for them to give back towards the river.
There was an intermission in the firing from eight o’clock until about nine. But from nine until long past midnight the sound of artillery and small arms was well nigh deafening. The explanation was ready. Jackson was pressing them with a night fight. Our boys drove the Yankees, who stoutly held their ground, until near day; and at early dawn on Sunday the fight began on both ends of the line, and by eleven o’clock the firing had ceased. On the upper end of the line, near Chancellorsville, the Yankees were badly whipped, and were in full retreat towards the river. On the lower line, near Fredericksburg, however, they had succeeded in carrying Marye’s Heights, and were rioting in the wild excess of joy. They had stormed, they said the Gibraltar of America, and their route to Richmond was plain and easy, little remembering that they had hurled a column of fully ten thousand upon one regiment in front, and thus gaining the rear of the rest of Barksdale brigade.
But best laid schemes of […]men and mice gang aft agree,’ and whilst the Yankees were felicitating themselves on their splendid successes, and in imagining themselves to be in the rear of our army, General Lee was so manoeuvering as to meet the enemy, who were now throwing themselves forward from the town on the Plank Road. About four o’clock on Sunday evening McLaws’ division, including Wilcox’s brigade of Anderson’s division, met the advance column of the Yankees, under General Sedgwick, at Salem Church, four miles beyond Fredericksburg, on the Plank Road, and our line of battle was formed at right angles with the Plank Road. The battle here raged for about two hours, but the Yankees were repulsed with considerable loss, including some five or six hundred prisoners. Our line on the telegraph road meantime had been formed at Smock, about three and a half miles out from town. Early on Monday morning Lawton’s old brigade, now General Gordon’s, supported by General Smith and General Hayes, all of Early’s Division, advanced towards Marye’s Heights, and charged them without the firing of a gun, driving the enemy from a position from which less than twenty-four hours before he had dislodged Barksdale gallant Mississippians, after a most heroic resistance, in which the enemy’s loss was quite considerable. In this condition matters remained until about five o’clock in the evening, when a general advance was ordered. At the firing of a signal gun, General Early moved upon the enemy from the right, and Generals Anderson and McLaws from the left. The enemy, who held a position of the Plank road, extending up and down, were quickly dislodged and driven with great loss from the field. Their resistance was slight. The charge was grand. Early’s men, and especially the Louisianians, under Hayes, walked over the enemy as giants over pigmies, while from above, the men of Anderson and McLaws, who had been constantly marching and fighting for five days, showed no signs of relaxation, but marched boldly and fearlessly up to their appointed work. The result was the enemy was driven in confusion towards Banks’ Ford, across which he succeeded in making his way during the night – not, however, without serious loss in killed, wounded and prisoners. General Hoke, of the North Carolina brigade, in Early’s division, was wounded in this charge. Whilst this was going on, Barksdale’s men were holding the stone wall, Marye’s Hill and the heights commanding the Plank Road, so as to prevent a movement on our rear out from Fredericksburg. But this was hardly necessary. Yankee desire for a general advance had been satisfied, and by nightfall the Yankees had begun to prepare for the third and last time to evacuate Fredericksburg – and by day-break our pickets were in the town, which is once again in the hands of Barksdale’s men.
Though the enemy at Chancellorsville did not recross the river at the United States Ford until today, there has been no general engagement since Sunday – only some occasional skirmishing and feints of attack to cover up their retreat across the river. Hooker, though having the choice of position, did not act offensively after crossing, but fortified and threw himself on the defensive, thus forcing our men to contend against him in this fight against vastly superior numbers, aided by breastworks, fortifications and obstructions of all sorts. But they were of little avail; Jackson turned their flank and fell upon their rear. And Jackson’s boys did their work with all their might and main. They charged faster over the battle field than they marched to it, and their cheering as they drove the enemy before them, broke upon the air with fine, inspiring effect, and told too plainly that our men were terribly in earnest.
The battle field, which reaches from Fredericksburg to a point above Wilderness, some twelve miles up from town, and out to the river, with the exception of about two miles between Salem and Zoar churches, attests the skillful aiming and deadly destruction of our artillery. The Yankee dead and wounded are strewn over the entire country. Yet had it not have been one of the most thickly wooded sections of land in Virginia the Yankee loss would have been far greater. Over this same field of battle are scattered, in immense quantities blankets, overcoats, canteens, knapsacks, haversacks, cartridge boxes, and any quantity of rifles, muskets, and various other equipments of the soldier. Our boys, however, found but little to eat. The Yankees had well nigh devoured the commissariat, still a good quantity of hard tack, with some good cooked meats and coffee, were found in the Yankee haversacks. We also captured some freshly slaughtered meats, and some corn and oats; all of which are quite valuable, and just the articles we needed.
Fredericksburg, on this occasion, did not suffer severely as she did before, though the Yankees managed to steal a good deal. Private houses, I believe, were in no instance entered, where the families were present, and the town was not shelled, nor were any citizens arrested or carried off in the town. A few were arrested outside, but in every instance I believe they were rescued by our own soldiery.
Hooker commanded in person at the Chancellorsville fight, and occupied a position near that place during the fight. Hooker has made a good fight. He has manoeuvred well, and done better than any other Yankee General; but Hooker is not the equal of Lee. He has so manoeuvred and combined as to surround the Yankees twice, and drive them back to the river, when they supposed, on both occasions, that they had gotten into his rear, and were about to surprise him; whilst General Jackson has outdone himself, and exhibited the highest characteristics of a strategist and skillful General, fully confirming all his past renown, and adding new laurels to the many already won in the service of his country.
Our losses are fully 5000, whilst those of the Yankees are confessed to be fully 25,000, and about thirty pieces of artillery. We have captured very near 8000 prisoners, and have lost, I suppose, about 1000 prisoners. These results of the fight point most conclusively to a most brilliant Confederate victory.