Darkness at Chancellorsville

by Ralph Peters

  And he would not be the less, he would bear this trial.

  A misery, though, a misery.

  Delsie. Why did she command his memories? It was disloyal to his mother and kin, to whom his thoughts should cling.

  Avoiding a hot pile of horse droppings left by the cavalry gone ahead, he sidestepped into Bob Price, who shoved him off with a minor imprecation: It was all business now, all war again. Which made him recall the perfectly reasonable explanation of the war’s necessity that Lieutenant Borden offered to all who were of half a mind to listen. They had not taken up arms to preserve slavery, Borden insisted. They were fighting to protect the right to hold slaves, same as the right of a man to own his own house or hold title to land. The niggers themselves hardly figured. It was all about a man’s rights, about Southern manhood’s virile resistance to sanctimonious tyranny. Let one right be stripped away, and the others would soon be taken.

  Where would that leave even the poorest man?

  With tormented feet, Sam Pickens reckoned.

  Nine thirty a.m.

  Chancellor house

  Holding out a dispatch he’d drafted personally, Joe Hooker said, “Get this off to General Howard immediately.”

  Brigadier General Van Alen had arrived to provide relief to crumbling Dickinson, who’d been worked beyond his capacity. He took the message and stepped off sharply.

  Hooker stretched, feeling his good muscles. Still give a younger man a time of it. Or, preferably, a young woman. He rubbed his eyes, wary of a return of his headaches, and allowed himself a moment’s sit-down before plowing through the latest reports and dispatches.

  The morning had been mixed, but largely positive. His ride along the army’s lines had drawn extravagant cheers: The men remained in good spirits. And with the telegraph functioning again, Butterfield had sent confirmation that Longstreet was still at Suffolk in southern Virginia, depriving Lee of two of his finest divisions. Best of all, treetop observers reported glimpsing movement in Lee’s lines, infantry and artillery—and they seemed to be marching westward and then southward. If the movement continued, it meant that Lee was, indeed, retreating on Gordonsville. Ingloriously flying.

  There had been some delay in field reports reaching him, since he’d been off on his tour for almost two hours, but Dan Sickles now had approval to push artillery forward and shell the Rebs. To help them along.

  If only he truly had Lee on the run, it would count as the victory that changed the course of the war. Let Grant succeed or fail on the Mississippi, this would be the turning point men remembered.

  Even those Rebel witches had volunteered to nurse the wounded soldiers, in blue or gray, in the rooms turned into wards. Perhaps there was hope for the world.

  After the war, should he stay in New York and grow wealthy? Or return triumphantly to California? The choice was delicious.

  Concerns remained, though, and he intended to see to them. It wasn’t a time to let down one’s guard, no time for foolish errors. John Reynolds had not received the first set of orders sent to get his First Corps on the march to Chancellorsville. Then Confederate shelling had delayed him. Reynolds was marching hard now, on the north side of the river, but he was unlikely to arrive before evening or even night, leaving the army’s right flank hanging open.

  And Otis Howard, annoyingly lackadaisical, had not acted upon his order of the previous day to refuse his flank and prepare west-facing defenses. Yes, it appeared that Lee was quitting the field. But Hooker did not trust Lee or Jackson one bit. One had to be prepared for unwelcome surprises, even now.

  And Howard had remained unconcerned during their ride along the Eleventh Corps lines. Hooker had even overheard him telling the army’s chief engineer that no attacker could make it through the undergrowth on his flank. Hooker had refrained from upbraiding the corps commander and embarrassing him in front of his subordinates, but now he regretted the courtesy. By the time he had returned to his headquarters, his concern had swelled to the bursting point. So he’d sent Howard a directive to be prepared to resist not only a possible frontal attack but a flanking movement as well.

  He hoped Lee wouldn’t try to bring off some stunt, that he’d leave without fighting. It really was the best solution for all.

  Flaring again, he decided that the message just sent to Howard had not been firm enough. Horace Greeley’s favorite one-armed Christian abolitionist had seemed lethargic, at best, and needed the spurs applied. The man had looked exhausted, true—but weren’t they all bone weary? His own headaches, his queer spells, were formidable, but he mastered them. Everyone just had to stand up on his hind legs and do his duty.

  He would have welcomed a glass of whiskey, though.

  “Van Alen!” he called. “To me.”

  The brigadier general quick-marched through the crowd of staff men and hangers-on.

  “Take this down,” Hooker told him. “Additional message to Howard.”

  “Yes, sir.” Van Alen drew out a notebook and a pencil.

  “General Howard … the right of your line … does not appear to be strong enough.”

  Van Alen scribbled and looked up again, ready.

  “No artificial defenses worth naming have been thrown up … and there appears to be a scarcity of troops at that point…”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “… and not, in the commanding general’s opinion … as favorably posted as might be.” Hooker paused, wondering what remained unsaid, undone.

  “That all, sir?”

  Hooker’s head abruptly began to throb again. Why must he bear this? He’d expected the fresh air of his inspection tour to have bought him more peace.

  “Add that the enemy is moving to our right. And that Howard’s corps has to keep a heavy reserve.”

  Van Alen raised an eyebrow. “Sir … I thought it had been decided that Lee was retreating?”

  Hooker nodded curtly. “He is retreating, damn it. But I want goddamned Howard to pay attention. I can’t trust anyone, anything.…”

  He dipped his head and pressed his hands to his temples.

  “Just get the message off, will you?”

  Ten a.m.

  The March

  Press on, press on!” Jackson called as he rode forward. “No straggling, keep up. Press on.”

  He longed to drive them harder but knew he dared not. His soldiers had to arrive with the strength left to fight. So the march had to be kept to a pace of two miles per hour, with pauses. It grated on him to do the mathematics and realize how little of the day would be left him to slay God’s enemies.

  As Jackson regained the head of the infantry column, with Rodes, mounted, at the front of his division, he neglected to so much as nod. He respected Rodes, who fought well and earned his promotions without politics. Tall, broad of shoulder, and lean, Rodes even looked the part of the ideal warrior. But there was too much on Jackson’s mind for niceties.

  The lithe tongue was the foe of the flaming sword.

  He reviewed each detail of the march, with Fitz Lee clearing the path ahead, while Stuart deployed the rest of the cavalry on the flank of the march, pushing out troopers to block each road and trail that might let the Yankees stumble upon the column. He’d placed Rodes’ division first in the order of march, since Rodes exacted discipline and would permit no delays. Raleigh Colston came next, in temporary command, while Powell Hill brought up the rear. Chastised and chastened, Hill would not dally today; still, it irked Jackson that Hill was next in seniority.

  As for artillery support, each division had its batteries, but the only wagons permitted to clutter the march were ammunition carriers and ambulances.

  Even with all things superfluous pared away, Jackson calculated that the tail of the column would just be beginning its march as the head neared its attack position. Based on the latest returns, he led thirty-three thousand men of all arms, while Lee had been left to face Hooker’s might with fewer than fifteen thousand.

  But Thomas Jackson had faith that the Lord
, the God of Battles, would see justice done.

  He refused to think of his wife, his flawless esposa. When she entered his mind, he expelled her. There was no time. Not even for the child.

  War demanded all of a man, and he had no patience with anyone who gave less.

  The mounted party of generals and colonels had fallen silent at Jackson’s arrival. Rodes smoothed his mustaches and stared ahead. Crutchfield’s eyes narrowed, expression as grim as his guns. The others of lesser rank strove to look severe. But they were Southern gentlemen all and could not go long without talk. Tom Munford, trailing his cavalrymen, announced that, by his calculation, almost two dozen faculty members or graduates of VMI would be in this attack.

  Jackson snapped his head up and threw back his shoulders. Yes, he himself, Rodes, Colston, Crutchfield, Munford, so many others. Turning to Munford, he said:

  “Colonel, the Institute will be heard from today.”

  With that, the silence was broken and a mood of goodwill and confidence swept the party. Relieved of his calculations for the moment, Jackson added:

  “If I had one more division, we would destroy them utterly. We would humble them as Jericho was humbled.”

  “I suspect we’ll do well enough, sir,” Bob Rodes offered.

  But Jackson had been taken by his vision. There were never enough men, not ever. He added:

  “Our problem … this army’s problem … is that we never have enough men to keep a reserve. We have to put everybody in and there’s no reserve when needed, no men left to finish things. And they escape us.”

  “Won’t many escape us today,” Tom Munford said. He still possessed the confidence of youth.

  Jackson grew silent again.

  Ten fifteen a.m.

  Dowdall’s Tavern, Eleventh Corps headquarters

  Carl Schurz held in his hand a message he hoped would bring Howard to his senses.

  It had been a disheartening morning. Enraptured by the cheers of the troops as he rode the lines, Hooker had not challenged Howard regarding the neglected flank and the corps commander’s obvious disobedience. Hooker had seemed to take the matter lightly.

  This message, just delivered, corrected the oversight.

  Schurz stood on the tavern’s porch, waiting for the orderly to wake Howard. With reports streaming in from pickets who’d sighted Confederates on the march, he’d ridden off to the high ground on Talley’s farm to see for himself. And there they had been, unmistakable, in a dirty-gray column glimpsed through a break in the trees, not two miles distant. They were moving across the corps’ front, not to the south.

  Meanwhile, artillery fire had erupted to the southeast, echoing the fight of the previous day. That would be a distraction. The Confederates were attempting an envelopment. It could not have been any clearer.

  Was that Jackson out there?

  He’d galloped back to the tavern, pausing only to order young Dilger to seek out west-facing positions for his guns. And he’d found Howard grumpy and haggard, skeptical of every word.

  Instead of showing alarm, the corps commander had told him:

  “Schurz, I’m blown. Tried to get some sleep last night, but they gave me no quarter, woke me every half hour until I gave up. Look here. You’re my number two, I want you to stay here while I nap. Read any messages, deal with the nonsense, but don’t take any action. And don’t let anyone roust me unless it’s important.” Before he retired, he added, “Truly important.”

  This message was truly important.

  The half hour prior to its arrival had been a torment for Schurz, left powerless while Howard took to his cot. He’d stood, arms folded, watching supply wagons and even a sutler crowd the single road that served the corps.

  The morning was gorgeous, ironically so. Its azure and golden grace called to mind the Rheinland and, for a moment, he’d felt an unaccustomed surge of homesickness, of Heimweh, along with his hopelessness. But soon enough he remembered that this was his home, this land of immense freedoms, and a finer one than ever he had known.

  This was mankind’s chance. In Europe, the counterrevolution had prevailed, leaving the people chained as never before. Now the Confederates fought to uphold their own ancien régime, a lingering aristocracy based not only on slavery but on serfdom—call the latter what you might, it was feudalism pure. The forces of reaction must not prevail, not here. Freedom, the wondrous freedom of here and now, in these United States … it was worth dying for, if need be.

  But no good man should die without necessity because of the sour mood of a man who had been unwisely empowered.

  Bravery on the field of battle was easy, Schurz had learned. A man simply got caught up in it. Harder by far were the challenges in between, the need to subdue oneself and serve a common good, to accommodate men you not only disliked but even despised, for a higher purpose. He recalled all too clearly how the Frankfurt parliament had frittered freedom away, as personalities and programs clashed, as petty jealousies undid great dreams and Freiheit bled to death amid endless squabbling.

  And so he had struggled to get along with Howard, to show forbearance, and to keep his officers in line and loyal. They had to find common ground, to remember their shared cause. At least Howard was committed to ending slavery, to preserving the Union, to human liberty. And he was a brave man, if pigheaded.

  If only …

  Schurz did not believe in God, but he found himself praying to the vastness that Howard would see sense.

  What was taking the fellow so long? Was his slumber that profound?

  Howard appeared from around the corner, awkwardly fitting his sword belt over his coat with the one hand left him.

  “What on earth is it now?” he demanded.

  Schurz held out the message. “It’s best if you read it yourself, sir.”

  Howard snapped the message from Schurz’s fingers. As he read it, his face grew sullen. Schurz almost expected him to ball it up, but instead the corps commander handed it back.

  “Have it logged.”

  Schurz hesitated. “Orders, sir? Should we tighten the lines? Refuse the flank in depth?”

  Howard looked genuinely surprised. “Don’t be absurd.”

  “But the message … it’s an order.…”

  “For Heaven’s sake, don’t be such a … such a German. Spare me the lessons and lectures, would you? You haven’t any military background, none to speak of.” Howard looked into the distance, past a teamsters’ quarrel out on the road. “Joe’s just got the jumps. All the responsibility on his shoulders. Natural enough to have moments of weakness. Yesterday, for instance. If Butterfield were here, he’d buck him up.” He fussed with the fit of his sword belt. “One thing that man’s good for.”

  Working his way through the jumble on the road, another courier made haste toward the tavern. He slipped from his horse a mere yard from the porch. Saluting and sweating, he offered his message to Howard.

  The corps commander smirked at Schurz. “Marching orders, I suspect. Get after Lee.” He glanced eastward. “That artillery. Their rear guard, no doubt.”

  But after Howard had opened the message and read it, his look turned cutting.

  He passed the paper to Schurz. “You’ll delight in this.”

  It was another directive from Hooker, restating his last order still more forcefully: Howard was to prepare to defend his flank.

  Schurz raised his eyes to Howard.

  The corps commander waved his one hand dismissively. “Oh, I’ll see to it, do something or other. Never expected Joe to be such an old hen.”

  “It says we’re to form a strong reserve,” Schurz noted. “If we shortened the line and Devens refused the flank … my division could—”

  “That’s Frank Barlow’s job, his brigade’s the largest in the corps. I should think that’s reserve enough.”

  From the direction of Chancellorsville, rifle fire joined the artillery shelling.

  “Hear that?” Howard asked. “If there is a proper scrap today, we�
�re unlikely to get near it. The fact is this corps isn’t needed. Lee’s whipped, and he knows it.”

  “General Howard…”

  “Go back to your division, Schurz. I’m wide-awake now. And try not to frighten your soldiers with ghosts and goblins.”

  Twelve thirty p.m.

  Catherine Furnace Road

  General Posey, you must blunt their advance,” Lee said, striving to conceal the alarm he felt.

  “We’ll do it, sir,” Posey, a Mississippian of intense dignity, promised. “By God, we’ll do it!”

  His men double-quicked forward, raising their hats in salute at the sight of Lee.

  Lee disciplined the muscles of his face: The men must see confidence.

  It was as he had feared: With Jackson well on his way, the Federals had shown curiosity then spunk, and a fight for the furnace had begun to develop, threatening to further divide the army. Colonel Best had returned from the field with the flag of his Georgians but not with the Georgians themselves: The regiment had been captured. A give-and-take of skirmishers had exploded into a crisis.

  Ahead, the firing intensified. Federal cheers met Rebel yells. More Union guns joined the fray.

  They just had to hold now, to keep those people at bay, until Jackson could strike.

  Nor was the situation entirely disadvantageous. If Hooker’s attention could be held here, if he could be mesmerized by the fight under way, Jackson would have an even greater chance at achieving surprise.

  He waved up his chief of staff: Posey’s Brigade would not be sufficient. Judging by the roar of the Union batteries, at least another brigade would be required. He would have to thin his lines elsewhere and take the risk. Then wait.

  The fate of the South, of their world, lay with Jackson now.

  Pulling off his riding gloves, Lee discovered a tick on the back of his hand. He pinched it off and crushed it between his fingers.

  “Hooker,” he muttered.

  Two p.m.

  Hazel Grove

  By damn, that’s how you do it,” Sickles cried.

  His forward artillery positively pounded the Rebs. His corps had driven them back a mile since the first shots were exchanged, and he’d bagged four hundred prisoners—including three hundred bedraggled Georgians from a single regiment.