III
. The Fight to the South
From Fredericksburg’s City Docks, Dad
& I headed south from town along modern route
2/17. The road has retained its historic character
as a busy turnpike. During the war it was known
as both the “Old Richmond Road” and
“Bowling Green Road.” It would serve
as the start and end point for the Union I Corps
assault. Today you’d never know of the road’s
significance if not aware of it. A group of industrial
parks line the paved state route, ranch homes interspersed.
It’s more working class than the town itself.
The land to the left (east) of the route molds into
a bend in the Rappahannock. This was the site of
the lower crossing, now on private land. There,
across what was a stretch of riparian fields, the
greater portion of Franklin’s troops assembled
. . . We continued down 2/17, passed a John Deere
dealer, the beginnings of a sprawling new residential
subdivision and a GM Powertrain factory. Only the
subdivision seemed outside the bounds of simple
progress. Situated squarely across the area of the
U.S. Left Grand Division lodgment, it was your typical
new “scorched-earth” development . .
. My cynicism was spawned, in part, by a major fight
over 300+ acres of core battlefield adjacent to
Chancellorsville ten miles to our west. Despite
massive public outcry, the owner of the plot was
threatening to sell the entire parcel of 800 acres
to a developer with the grand destructive vision
of a community of over 2,000 homes and 2.2 million
square feet of commercial space. This would, in
effect, create a new city on the outskirts of a
hallowed National Military Park. The Spotsylvania
County Board of Supervisors would wisely disapprove
the sale in late March. However, the owner still
claimed rights to build 200 homes and develop 55
acres commercial – and seemed ready &
willing if for no other reason than spite. I see
this scene repeat itself to a nauseating degree:
the shameless pursuit of a bottom-line the sole
reason that the cause of land preservation requires
vigilance and money. There’s no past or
future once the bulldozers start rolling. And this
development along 2/17, though not on “core
battlefield,” drew my ire nonetheless . .
. The views along the Old Richmond Road grew more
rural as we rolled up towards our next stop. A pull-off
facing west, it overlooked farmland still looking
much as it did in 1862. Across these fields the
divisions of George G. Meade and John Gibbon would
attack the vaunted troops of “Stonewall”
Jackson lined up to meet them in the wooded hills
beyond. It would underscore the nature of Union
failures at Fredericksburg and presage the outdated
futility of Napoleanic assaults: hurling masses
of men across open fields and against the rifled
fury of well-engineered defensive positions.
Robert E. Lee’s defensive line arched across
Burnside’s entire front, stretching over ten
miles. The Army of Northern Virginia’s
left flank rested on the Rappahannock above town
and angled down the abrupt hills west of town. Centered
on the prominent “Marye’s Heights”
(on which sat the landmark mansion, “Bromptom”)
this northern sector was defended by Longstreet’s
I Corps, the first Confederate troops to reach Fredericksburg
in late November. His line extended to the right
over hills and down saddles to connect with Jackson’s
II Corps, arrayed along a ridge that sloped down
to the army’s far right at “Prospect
Hill” and “Hamilton’s Crossing”
– the latter a rural stop along the RF&P.
Lee’s cavalry, under the proven showman J.
E. B. Stuart, screened the far right flank in the
“no man’s land” between it and
the river. Lee had a defensive position most commanders
never achieve. His whole line was elevated. Still,
Robert E. Lee was not one to rest on perceived advantages.
He looked to this southern sector as a potential
vulnerability on the morning of December 13th. The
massive Union army had begun to stir. If Franklin’s
force could punch through or outflank Jackson’s
line, Longstreet’s formidable defense to the
north would be untenable before the surely inexhaustible
blue waves of Sumner and Hooker. Stonewall’s
men had yet to fail Lee. That reputation was about
to be put to the test.
All night and into the early morning of the 13th,
Franklin and his officers awaited the orders that
must surely come: attack at dawn. And this
was the order issued by Burnside on the night of
the 12th, but it did not reach Franklin until 7
a.m. History attributes the failure of prompt delivery
to the messenger. Still, when the orders were read
they were not conclusive. To Franklin the order
implied a diversionary attack. O’Reilly convincingly
claims that Burnside’s orders were not fully
understood, claiming that he meant for the U.S.
Left G.D. to push forward then drive in force on
the C.S. flank. In coordination with the secondary
assaults of Sumner and Hooker to the north, Lee’s
line would buckle at any number of points and give
way. Yet Franklin – cautious and deliberate
– proceeded as per his stale interpretation.
John Reynold’s reputable I Corps was ordered
up and George G. Meade’s division singled
out to drive across the RF&P in their front
and into the Confederate line under cover of the
forested rise before them. The divisions of John
Gibbon and Abner Doubleday (the same Abner Doubleday)
would support Meade on the right and left, respectively.
The Old Richmond Road was their assembly point.
By mid-morning long drumrolls were calling the field
to attention. The Union formations aligned in neat
orderly rows as nerves were steeled. The “ball”
was about to open.
* * *
Dad & I pulled out and continued down the “new”
Old Richmond Road not quite another mile. We turned
right on “Benchmark Road” and pulled
off a shoulder at the intersection. With the car
still running, we both scanned the crossroads. On
the southwest corner we found what we were after:
a short squat marble marker. This was the heart
of the mentioned “no man’s land”
patrolled by Stuart’s C.S. cavalry, the “Pelham”
marker documenting the major role they would play
. . . With Meade’s division forming across
the Old Richmond 1000 yards to their north, Stuart’s
24 year-young chief-of-artillery , John Pelham,
raced a single gun to this exposed position, aimed
up the road and began to lob shells into the anxious
Union troops. Another gun was brought up. The havoc
they created was demoralizing. U.S. guns answered
en masse, but had trouble finding the range –
Pelham’s men wisely situating themselves in
a low depression. When the Union artillerists did
home in, Pelham ordered the guns moved after every
shot. This went on for over half-an-hour before
Pelham’s men were routed out. Two guns had
disrupted the U.S. Left G.D.’s assault to
the adoration of every Confederate within view –
especially their commander, Robert E. Lee, who reportedly
proclaimed: “It is glorious to see courage
in one so young.”
The fields over which Meade & Gibbons'
divisions advanced |
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The Pelham Marker |
The
feat of the C.S. “horse” artillerists
in our rear-views Dad & I pushed on, taking
a right on “Mine Road” in angling around
the position of Jackson’s far right on Prospect
Hill . . . December 13, 1862, unfolded bright and
clear. A cold morning gave way to higher temperatures.
This and the footfall of thousands turned the thawing
fields into troughs of sludge. The U.S. I Corps,
now aligned for attack, was ordered to lay down
in the mud as a pre-assault cannonade ruptured the
tension and announced the commencement of battle.
It was 11 o’clock. Franklin looked to soften
the C.S. defense. Jackson wisely ordered no response
until the assault was underway. The wait along the
Confederate line was desperate and deadly. Shells
rained down on their positions. The silent Confederate
batteries on top of Prospect Hill lost so many horses
that it was awarded the gruesome epithet, “Dead
Horse Hill” . . . As we rode up towards the
southern unit of the National Park we found ourselves
in disbelief, talking over the ability of men to
endure such a barrage the way these men were expected
to. Within the whole of the foul ugly conditions
that were standard to Civil War soldiers, there
seemed little worse to us than this. There was just
no recourse under a cannonade, flinching, praying,
mortal fear, entire companies trying to blend into
the earth – the whistle of incoming shells
and the random prospect of an indescribable limb-ripping
wound or instant blood-and-brain spraying death
– watching other men die then being required
to “go forth and do your duty.” Horrific.
I think of this every time I feel that I’m
having a bad day. At that moment, we were both left
shaking our heads . . . We drove past a few of the
ubiquitous modern developments that ring the park,
“Cavalry Ridge” and “Lee’s
Hill” – as if titled in some impotent
attempt to honor the watershed event it was encroaching
on. We turned right then right again on “Lee
Drive,” which led us onto our first stretch
of the National Park since Chatham that morning.
Driving slowly and stopping often we continued our
often-tread discussion of “being a Civil War
soldier” . . . Documenting it fully would
require more time than you the reader and
I the author have. So I’ll say this:
despite the efforts of writers and historians, painters
and movie producers, we can never have a true mortal
sense of living through that era of combat. Only
combat itself can compare; and even then, nothing
in the modern-era could prepare us for the level
of sacrifice that was the filthy disease-ridden
day-to-day existence to these soldiers. We can read
the stories, can imagine and feel a modicum of the
writhing hell of a Civil War battlefield. But minus
– first-hand – the primal destruction
of bodies, the asphyxiating sulfuric discharge from
black-powder weapons, the days after rent by the
guttural cries of the wounded languishing to death
between the lines, the sickening smell of dead rotting
horses and men – we can know nothing of this
war. Studying it has had a pacifying effect on my
views towards the methodology of solving conflicts.
Our Civil War was a horrific bloodbath. It is testament
to the strength of our culture – what it was
and, more importantly, what it was to be
– that the country could absorb such a tragedy
and still prosper as we have. And we have. And
we can never forget the price paid for it.
Franklin's assault
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We
proceeded slowly, were suddenly detached from the
suburban surroundings bordering the park and set
within preserved woodlands thick with underbrush.
Deer bounded across the road. Dogwoods were beginning
to bloom. Weather-worn Confederate trenches lined
the northeast side of the road to our right, the
drive itself following the course of a road built
prior to the battle by C.S. “Pioneers,”
called the “Military Road.” This was
Stonewall Jackson’s front line . . . With
the Union guns falling silent, Meade’s division
was ordered up from the mud and across the Old Richmond
Road. About a thousand yards, most of it exposed,
separated the waiting Confederates of A. P. Hill’s
division, Jackson’s C.S. II Corps, from the
oncoming assault. The bluecoats had no sooner reached
a rhythmic gait when the Confederate batteries opened
up. A soldier in the 16th Maine wrote, “[the
Rebels] threw over a whole blacksmith shop, anvil
and all.”(13)
The U.S. I Corps attackers dropped back to the mud,
as their own superior firepower answered in full
voice. Back and forth the Union and Confederate
artillerists fired projectile after projectile,
a protracted bloody duel of which the U.S. guns
finally got the better. By 1 p.m., the Confederates
had taken another terrible pounding and Meade’s
men moved forward. From left to right, the brigades
of C. F. Jackson, Sinclair and Magilton rushed to
the RF&P, over halfway between the Old Richmond
and the C.S. line. There they leveled their muskets
and delivered an initial volley into the leafless
woods before them. They were answered with a sheet
of flame and lead. The C.S. brigades of Archer,
Gregg and Lane faced the attacking Jackson, Sinclair
and Magilton, respectively. But Hill had set Gregg
and Lanes’ troops with a sizable gap between
their flanks. Hill believed that no troops could
make it through a swampy bottomland stretch at the
front left foot of Prospect Hill. South Carolinian
Maxcy Gregg and his troops were under the same impression.
They were both wrong. Meade’s three U.S. brigades
plunged across the tracks under increasing fire.
Sinclair and Magilton’s men reached the swamped
treeline and charged in. Casualties mounted quickly.
Conrad F. Jackson was shot dead leading his brigade.
Archer’s Tennesseans in their front were confident
and supported by all of Jubal Early’s division.
They pinned (U.S.) Jackson’s brigade –
now without their leader – under a deadly
rain of lead. An unforeseen consequence of Pelham’s
impetuosity had been to halt the formation of Doubleday’s
division on Meade’s left and readjust its
focus towards securing Franklin’s far-left.
The legendary “father of baseball” and
his troops did not advance, leaving the left of
Meade’s assault – C. F. Jackson’s
men – “hanging in the air” . .
. To Meade’s right, John Gibbon’s division
had moved up. The brigades of Taylor, Lyle and Root
were stacked like a battering ram in moving forward.
Taylor’s and then Lyle’s men both ran
headlong into the rifles of James Lane’s North
Carolinians situated left of the gap in the C.S.
line, and behind the RF&P rail bed. C.S. artillery
to their left and near a group of slave cabins poured
into the flank of the assault, as well. Gibbon’s
initial waves were thrown back short of the RF&P.
A recollection documents Private William Martin
of the 28th North Carolina, who “coolly sat
on the [railroad] track, and called to his comrades
to watch the Yankee colors, then he fired and down
they went. This was done repeatedly.”(14)
But despite this initial success, Lane’s men
were exhausting their ammunition and strength. The
U.S. brigades of Sinclair and Magilton had not only
crossed the “non-crossable” swampland,
but were rolling into the left flank of Gregg’s
surprised Confederates. Gregg, on sighting the menacing
wave approaching through the smoke-choked woods,
believed them to be friendly and ordered his troops
to cease firing. Gregg was mortally wounded as the
Northerners burst from the smoke. His brigade disintegrated
before the rush. Sinclair and Magiltons’ troops,
a single amalgamation at this point, flowed in a
wave over the Military Road and drove into the gap.
The evaporation of Gregg’s brigade created
a ripple effect down the C.S. line. The left of
Archer’s and right of Lane’s troops
came unglued. Meade’s men crashed into the
wavering Confederates. Add to this the only real
support Meade would receive in the form of Gibbon’s
final brigade under Adrian Root. With Lane’s
Confederates having already fought off the better
part of a Union division, and their right buckling,
Root’s men plunged over the RF&P and into
a desperate hand-to-hand fight with the North Carolinians
– sweeping into their ranks those willing
from Gibbon’s first two brigades. In conjunction,
C. F. Jackson’s brigade, having been halted
at rail bed, charged with renewed vigor into the
wavering line of Archer’s Tennesseans. If
victory was to occur for the U.S. Left Grand Division,
it was to occur right then and there on the early
afternoon of December 13th.
Prospect Hill |
|
The old RF&P railroad, still an active
Amtrak line |
* * *
Lee Drive ends on Prospect Hill. Here we were able
to gain perspective on the terrain over which the
attack and defense took place. The fields to our
front – now interspersed with stands of trees
– were mostly clear in December 1862, providing
the attackers little cover until they were face-to-face
with the defenders. The land rises slowly up to
the point of the interpretive park signs and fixed
cannon, not enough to discourage attack –
but enough to wind the attackers. The immediate
area along the road and behind it are now thick
with forest, as they were in December 1862. The
mosquitoes were swarming. So, we opted against a
short walk to Hamilton’s Crossing. Time was
also passing swiftly. It was already 1 p.m. We started
to backtrack, pulling off a shoulder a few hundred
yards up to view one of the more unique Civil War
battlefield memorials I’ve seen. It’s
a stone pyramid about 15-20 feet high and across
the tracks to the east, a hundred yards in front
of where Stonewall’s men were positioned.
Dad & I calculated it as the area of C. F. Jackson’s
assault and subsequent repulse, the left of Meade’s
columns. An interpretive sign documents the pyramid
being built in 1903 by RF&P railroadmen as a
memorial to the Southern victory. Positioned here
it would pass by in plain view of all who rode the
train. As if to prove the point, an Amtrak commuter
train bowled past. In the modern-era, most passengers
– if they notice at all – most likely
wonder what the pyramid is about. But for those
who know, it’s quite a find – Confederate
battlefield memorials from that era a rare thing
. . . We continued on, back to the site of the C.S.
gap and “Meade’s breakthrough.”
Heavily forested with no clear view in front, this
site remains much as it was on December 13, 1862.
The Pyramid monument |
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Dad and C.S. trenches near"Meade's breakthrough"
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The fight to the South was now about who could feed
in reinforcements first. Meade’s men had broken
through with the added pressure of Gibbon’s
support; but they could never cement a hold on the
Military Road without help. It was not forthcoming,
the cautious Franklin still believing his assault
to be diversionary – though the opposite was
true. The Confederates, meanwhile, had plenty of
help: three divisions. Sizing up the situation,
the profane and hard-fighting Jubal Early threw
in. The conclusion then unfolded rapidly . . . Early
hurled the brigades of Atkinson and Walker into
the breach, Hill ordering Thomas’ brigade
– his only nearby reserve – to the aid
of Lane’s faltering line. Atkinson’s
Georgians drove into the confusion of the smoke-filled
woods and rolled over the blue unsupported mass.
With the Confederates bearing down from left, front
and right, the exhausted troops of Sinclair and
Magilton broke and backtracked over the ground they’d
fought so hard to win. The men of C. F. Jackson,
who had penetrated only to the foot of Prospect
Hill, were likewise swept back by the addition of
Hoke’s C.S. brigade. Meade’s men rallied
a final stand at the RF&P, but lacked in strength,
ammunition, and most importantly: solid reinforcements.
When U.S. III Corps division commander, David Birney,
was challenged by the then livid Meade for support,
he refused citing he’d been told to stay put.
Yet when the situation in front became clear, Birney’s
three brigades – brought across the Rappahannock
for the express purpose of support – were
thrown forward to halt the swing in momentum. And
this swing had been significant. The C.S. counterstroke
“boiled down the hillside,”(15)
writes O’Reilly; “The neat, compact,
organized brigades of Atkinson and Hoke caught the
Federals overextended and leaderless. Union resistance
crumbled.”(16)
The Georgian brigade was quickly caught up in the
moment, chasing the hasty and disorderly retreat
of Meade veterans towards the Old Richmond Road.
Gibbon’s men were by then taking a bloody
pounding from the fresh rifles in their front and
the Confederate artillery around the slave cabins.
They were forced to retreat, as well. The first
real U.S. reinforcements of the afternoon’s
fighting came in the form of Ward’s brigade,
first of the U.S. III Corps brigades. Yet in moving
forward, they were ensnared in the precipitous retreat.
Once clear, they were in no position to resist the
rolling “grey and butternut” lines of
Atkinson. And the Georgians came on alone as if
possessed. Not only had Franklin’s “diversion”
been thrown back, but now it seemed a full-fledged
C.S. counterattack was bearing down. Union artillery,
having been brought up for close support of the
infantry, leveled their barrels and let loose furious
rounds of canister (an ordnance that exploded on
being fired like a giant shotgun blast). This was
enough to check the exposed daring Confederates,
who only then realized they were dangerously exposed.
The U.S. III Corps brigades of Robinson and Berry
pitched into the Georgians and finally broke the
overzealous attack. The colorful 114th Pennsylvania
“zouaves” – regaled in red baggy
pants, white gaiters and turban-style headwraps
made famous by the crack French military outfit
of the day – led the way (“good looking
corpses,” was Dad’s take on the zouaves’
dress – this coming from a military veteran
of the modern-era) . . . And with this final furious
chapter now bloodied and reeling, the fight to the
south ground down. Opportunities won and lost were
now statistics made grim by the high loss of life.
Meade was fuming, and rightfully so. His men had
fought courageously and taken their objective, only
to be “hung out to dry.” At the highwater
mark of Meade’s breakthrough, Franklin had
near two corps at his disposal. Only the mentioned
III Corps troops were engaged as reinforcements;
and then, only in a defensive role after Meade and
Gibbon’s men had been routed out. A late-day
move by Stonewall Jackson to launch an all-out counteroffensive
never materialized due to logistics and nightfall.
And so ended the fight to the south . . . A Union
veteran involved in the assault and disgusted by
the lack of support, caustically spit, “I’ve
had enough of this damned business.”(17)
Sgt. Jacob Heffelfinger of Magilton’s brigade
– who was wounded and captured – documented
the events of the assault that very afternoon: “All
that we gained at so fearful a cost is lost . .
. Death had been doing fearful work today.”(18)
Franklin had thrown forward his faint unsupported
attack and failed. “Stonewall” Jackson
had stood his ground and prevailed. The waning notion
of Union victory now shifted north to the formidable
Confederate bastion on Marye’s Heights.
On top of Lee's Hill - Lee's HQ |
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The reconstructed "stonewall" at
Marye's Heights |
Click for Part IV .
Marye's
Heights / Epilogue
