by Burke Davis
Close behind was Pleasanton's struggling vanguard, its horses "so thoroughly exhausted," as the Federal commander said, "as to be unable to move the guns up the steep hills." The bluecoats pushed cannon uphill by hand as the last of Stuart's men splashed over the long, rough ford to Virginia.
Pelham waited on the Southern bank with his guns as Federal columns crowded to the entrance of the ford. But though Stuart's troopers halted to water their thirsty horses within sight and close range, the enemy did little more than threaten.
Behind, the Federal command had already begun recriminations over the failure to trap Stuart's raiders. Brigadier General Ho-bart Ward galloped to the ford with a few men at ten fifteen A.M. and reported to Pleasanton. He studied Stuart's riders through field glasses and tried to form a chase.
"It's too late," Pleasanton said. "There's nothing to be done now."
"Is there anything I can do?" Ward asked.
"Too late. You should have been here three hours ago."
Ward tried, through General Stoneman, to persuade Pleasanton to give him cavalry to go after Stuart in Virginia. Pleasanton refused "peremptorily," and for the rest of the afternoon the Federals watched the Confederate rear on the Virginia bank. Night came, with torrents of rain, and the chase was over.
The tale of President Lincoln's reaction to the failure soon circulated through the armies:
Lincoln was on a boat in the Potomac, surrounded by friends and officers. The President seemed in a high humor.
"Mr. President," someone asked, "what about McClellan?"
Lincoln pursed his broad lips into a solemn grimace, and with a stick drew a circle on the deck. "When I was a boy," he said, "we used to play a game—three times around, and out. Stuart has been around McClellan twice. If he goes around him once more, gentlemen, McClellan will be out."11
Stuart soon discovered a serious loss. Somewhere in Maryland his mulatto, Bob, had succumbed to sleep at the roadside—drunk, Major McClellan said. Bob had been leading two of Stuart's most highly prized mounts, "Sky Lark" and "Lady Margrave," and as he held their reins, snoring away, the enemy had seized him.
In all, the command had left about sixty horses behind, most of them lame or unable to keep the pace. The herd of captured mounts was immense, at least 1,200 strong, enough to see the cavalry division through the winter. There were also the thirty-odd mayors, postmasters and other town officials, who could be used as exchanges for Confederate generals and other important prisoners in the North.
The head of the column moved two or three miles into Virginia before halting. Hundreds, like Lieutenant Price, fell to the ground and were soon asleep, worn from two days and a night of ceaseless riding, but all were "soon roused up." The command went into Leesburg where there was a riotous greeting from the people of the town. Stuart and his staff stayed in the home of a Leesburg physician, where, Price wrote happily, he slept "elegantly in a nice bed."
The 1,800 spent the next morning in Leesburg, beginning to recover from their 130 miles in three days—the last 80 in twenty-four hours. There were tales to tell, but Jeb's staff was anxious to see The Bower and its lovely ladies just now.
The first riders reached the Dandridge plantation house just before daylight of October thirteenth, and did not wait for a decent hour. The banjo began and buglers joined the cornshucking music of the Stuart band; there was another serenade before the house which "roused all hands," Price recalled. The women came down. Stephen Dandridge soon had coffee for the staff, and the young men spun tales of the raid for the girls as they ate bread and sipped hot coffee. Price and a companion went into the house and slept for several hours.
Stuart arrived at noon with good news from headquarters. General Lee was "excessively gratified" and sent his warm thanks to the cavalry.
Major Douglas of Stonewall Jackson's staff saw the return of Stuart to army headquarters. Jackson grinned, making one of his clumsy jokes in greeting:
"Howdy do, General. Get off and tell us about your trip. They tell me that from the time you crossed the Potomac until you got back you didn't sing or crack a joke, but that as soon as you got on Virginia soil, you began to whistle 'Home, Sweet Home.' "
The returning cavalrymen celebrated the success of the raid on October fifteenth with a ball, and the music was as gay as ever, though the general missed Bob and his bones. Von Borcke noted that Stuart was "the hero of the occasion, and received many a pretty compliment from fair lips." During the evening von Borcke and others staged their pantomimes and charades, and the uproar lasted most of the night.
Stuart's wife had arrived in camp, and Flora entered into the spirit of the occasion. Her husband had just received some golden spurs from Baltimore, the gift of women admirers.
In a letter to Lily Parran Lee of Shepherdstown, Stuart wrote a line with an emphasis he perhaps did not intend:
Did you know a lady in Baltimore (anonymous) had sent me a pair of elegant gold spurs? They came while Flora was here and she buckled them on,12
There was gaiety at The Bower, at any rate, but beneath it there was thankfulness, in the reverent strain with which Stuart closed his report to General Lee.
Believing that the hand of God was clearly manifest in the signal deliverance of my command from danger and the crowning success attending it, I ascribe to Him the praise, the honour and the glory.
He restrained himself from signing this formal document as he signed many private letters in these days: "The Knight of The Golden Spurs."
CHAPTER 13
War in Winter
THE Knight of The Golden Spurs was elated by the success of the raid into Pennsylvania, and his report rang with triumphant phrases:
The results of this expedition, in a moral and political point of view, can hardly be estimated, and the consternation among the property-holders in Pennsylvania was beyond description. . . . My Staff are entitled to the highest praise. . . .
I marched from Chambersburg to Leesburg, 90 miles, with only one hour's halt, in thirty-six hours, including a forced passage of the Potomac—a march without parallel in history.
Stuart was not alone in his admiration for his feat. The North was disturbed, and President Lincoln, who had been vainly urging General McClellan to invade Virginia since the battle of Sharpsburg, wrote impatiently to his field commander:
Stuart's cavalry outmarched ours, having certainly done more marked service on the Peninsula and everywhere since.... Will not a movement of our army be a relief to the cavalry, compelling the enemy to concentrate, instead of foraying in squads everywhere?
A surprise for the returning raiders was Norman Fitzhugh of the staff, exchanged from a Northern prison and full of tales of his capture at Verdiersville.
There was a ball in the Dandridge House on October fifteenth, enlivened by von Borcke and Colonel Brien with more of their charades and tableaux. The cavalry officers had hardly returned to their tents when Stuart's buglers roused the camp: The enemy had crossed the river.
Jeb reached the front in the early morning, and he had not far to look. A division of bluecoat infantry had pushed south toward Winchester, and was already passing the settlement of Kearneysville: 6,000 infantry, 500 cavalry, and a number of guns.
Stuart took one of Jackson's infantry brigades from its work of tearing up railroad tracks and put it into line with his troopers. They fought all day, falling back slowly.
Jeb left a double line of pickets to watch the enemy, and returned from this skirmish with the staff through rain to The Bower, to the winged tunes of Sweeney's banjo. They trooped into the Dandridge drawing room and met two distinguished visitors, Francis Lawley, a member of Parliament and correspondent for the London Times, and Frank Vizetelly of the London Illustrated News. The English guests of the army had come in search of the famed chief of cavalry and seized him for interviews lasting late into the night. Von Borcke thought it a "delightful parley," and drank in news from abroad.
William Blackford's brother Charles noted that dancing
remained popular despite Vizetelly, and remarked that things were gay as if there had been no war. He added, "The General and William led the dance until one o'clock."1
Vizetelly was an artist; he sketched scenes of the cavalry camp, including the dancing and banjo playing, and Stuart with a group of his officers. The artist-correspondent also became a sensation as a chef when he ousted the cooks and boastfully attempted to improve Stuart's cuisine. Von Borcke recorded that he once produced in triumph "a roast pig, with the conventional apple in its mouth, raw on one side and burned to a cinder on the other. This work of art... was served as cochon a l’italienne, but it proved by no means so happy an accident as the original roast pig, done a la Chinoise"
In the shortening days of October the cavalry kept watch from the passes of the Blue Ridge, and patrolled the southern bank of the
Potomac. Federal parties occasionally pushed hard against the pickets, as if General McClellan were impatient to know where Lee's big army lay.
Stuart came back from a foray against the enemy to Jackson's camp and spent the night with Stonewall. He arrived late, and crawled into bed with Jackson. During the cold night he wrapped himself in the single blanket, and in the morning he awoke alone in the cot, fully clothed. Jackson made a wry joke of it.
"Stuart, I'm always glad to see you. But General," he sighed, rubbing his legs, "you must not get into my bed with your boots and spurs on and ride me around like a cavalry horse all night."2
Religious revivals began to sweep the army, and preachers swarmed. Stuart was not noted for his participation in the services, but he once scolded an officer who sneered at the preachers:
"I regard the calling of a clergyman as the noblest in which any human being can engage," Stuart said angrily.
Esten Cooke found Stuart in thoughtful moods during this time, Jeb told Flora's cousin two things that stuck in his memory:
"My proper place would be as Major of Artillery, and not as General of Cavalry."
And,
"If I am ever wounded, don't let them give me any whisky or brandy. I promised my mother when I was twelve that I would never touch it."3
Couriers galloped into headquarters in the night of October twenty-sixth. The time of leisure was over. General McClellan had thrown two divisions over the Potomac below Harpers Ferry; Stuart's pickets were driven back as far as Snickers Gap in the Blue Ridge. Headquarters prepared to leave The Bower for the last time.
The cavalry moved off into the rain of October twenty-ninth "with heavy hearts indeed," as von Borcke said. The rain ceased as they left the house and a cold wind blew in their faces. By late afternoon the weather was freezing.
The ranks were thin, for disease had cut Fitz Lee's command to fewer than 1,000 riders. Stuart was concerned about what he called "greased heel" crippling the horses.
Fitz Lee was ill and unable to ride with his men. Big Rooney Lee could not command in his stead because of a lingering wound from the Sharpsburg campaign. Stuart put Wickham in command. The objective of the brigade was Snickers Gap, which the cavalry was to hold while Robert Lee moved his two infantry corps to meet the growing Federal threat. Stuart was ordered to cover Longstreet's flank, keep the enemy from the Blue Ridge passes, and post a fifty-mile cordon of pickets between the army's wings. It was an impossible assignment.
On October thirtieth, Jeb opened a season of his petite guerre which was to become almost endless skirmishing. He caught three companies of the 1st Rhode Island Cavalry in Mountsville, and by circling them on a back road with the 9th Virginia took the Federal camp with fifty prisoners and drove* survivors as far as Aldie in the Bull Run Mountains.
But before Stuart dealt fully with the enemy he beat off another foray by Southern Womanhood. Von Borcke instigated it, riding through the street of Upperville, where he was halted by a group of girls carrying refreshments to the soldiers. "I was not strong enough to decline," he said. The girls pressed him for news of Stuart, whom they were anxious to see. The German promised to get them an audience. When Jeb galloped into the village, fifty or more women met him. The German wrote of Jeb: "surrounded by the ladies, all eager to catch the words that fell from his lips, and many with tears in their eyes kissing the skirt of his uniform coat or the glove upon his hand."
This was too much for Stuart. "Ladies," he said, "your kisses would be more acceptable on the cheek."
The young women hesitated but an elderly one threw her arms around his neck and kissed him soundly. Von Borcke watched in admiration:
"The kisses now popped in rapid succession like musketry, and at last became volleys, until our General was placed under as hot a fire as I had ever seen him sustain on the field of battle."
Stuart mounted at last, "almost exhausted," and rode off with von Borcke.
"Von," he said, "this is a pretty little trick you have played on me, but in the future I shall detail you for this sort of service."
Stuart felt the first serious pressure from the Union cavalry on November first near the hamlet of Mountsville. He clung to his position, but only John Pelham's guns held off the enemy late in the day.
General Pleasanton returned with support the next day and drove Stuart through the little town of Union, though Stuart fought his dismounted troopers behind stone fences so well that Pleasanton mistook them for infantry. It was again Pelham who made the contest almost equal.
The boy major was harassed by Federal sharpshooters who ran near his guns, picked off his horses, and went into a woodland to reload. When the bluecoat troopers had withdrawn to fill their rifles, Pelham followed unseen, took a gun to a concealed hilltop and surprised them with a load of canister. He then led a charge which took several prisoners and a regimental flag, without loss of a man.
But it was not a day of victory, even in Stuart's report: "... the enemy finally enveloped our position with his superior numbers ... so as to compel our withdrawal; but every hilltop and every foot of ground was disputed, so that the enemy made progress of less than a mile during the day."
The enemy claimed complete victory, but the cavalry screen still hung before the infantry. Stuart praised Pelham: "The incomparable Pelham . . . made a gallant and obstinate resistance."
Stuart had other matters on his mind at night, for there were disturbing letters from his brother-in-law, Dr. Charles Brewer - young Flora was ill, perhaps critically. Jeb spent the night in the plantation yard of an acquaintance, and with his officers ate "a gigantic saddle of Virginia mutton." He wrote his wife:
Dr. Brewer's first dispatch was received yesterday, and I answered it at once. The second came today, saying our darling's case was doubtful, and urges me in your name to come.
I received it on the field of battle. I was at no loss to decide that it was my duty to you and to Flora to remain here. I am entrusted with the conduct of affairs, the issue of which will affect you, her, and the mothers and children of our whole country much more seriously than we can believe.
If my darling's case is hopeless there are ten chances to one that I will get to Lynchburg too late; if she is convalescent why should my presence be necessary? She was sick nine days before I knew it. Let us trust in the good God, who has blessed us so much, that he will spare our child to us, but if it should please Him to take her from us, let us bear it with Christian fortitude and resignation.4
The next day was Sunday, November third; the enemy came on in even greater force. A cannonade burst about Union, and there was soon a pitched battle. Many of Stuart's men fell under enemy guns, a caisson blew up, and fire was so hot that von Borcke had to force frightened ambulance drivers to pick up the wounded by holding a pistol on them. In less than half an hour one of the batteries lost fifteen men. More and more lines of dismounted bluecoats attacked, and Stuart began his withdrawal. Pelham again covered the rear.
Captain William Blackford was sent scouting along the mountain ridges and returned with a discouraging report: McClellan's whole army was coming south. Jeb pulled the command back into the slopes
of the Blue Ridge.
Blackford got his first wound during the day, a painful rip in his calf from a bullet passing through his boot. The shock nauseated him; many bullets cut his clothing in the fighting. He had three horses shot under him, and lost half a dozen of his friends among the officers.
A day and night of confusion followed. Stuart took von Borcke and Dr. Talcott Eliason, the corps surgeon, and a few other officers to the headquarters of Jackson, seeking new orders to cover the changed positions of the armies. He left Rosser to hold the mountain passes and shield the cavalry's wagon train, not far away at the town of Piedmont.
The weather became bitter as Jeb led his little party over the rough trail the dozen or so miles to Stonewall. They forded the Shenandoah at midnight in cold so intense that their clothes froze stiff on their backs. They reached Jackson's camp at two A.M., but Stuart refused to wake up the commander, and they sat around a big fire, thawing, until Jackson stirred and gave them breakfast at dawn.
While the staff gratefully gulped hot coffee and cold venison, Stuart got his orders: He would not follow Longstreet's corps east, but remain near the Valley, to be on McClellan's flank.
Stuart led the group back along mountain ridges, the route often so wild that they had to hack their way through briers and grapevines. At five P.M., with the sun almost down, they came to a peak and saw, not far below: "the dark masses of the enemy with glittering arms, and beyond them the rapidly-disappearing lines of our horsemen." Stuart said quietly to von Borcke: "The Yankees have taken Ashby's Gap. Rosser is retreating. We're cut off."
