Jeb Stuart, The Last Cavalier

by Burke Davis

  Scheibert was also a painter, and helped Rooney Lee's wife to complete portraits she had made. He once went to her house near headquarters dressed in his usual short jacket and white trousers, looking, Blackford said, as if he had been melted and poured into the uniform. When he had finished a painting he placed the wet canvas on a chair and talked with Charlotte Lee, bouncing about the room in rapid conversation, gesturing nervously, jumping in and out of chairs. He sat on the freshly painted picture, but was unaware of it, and Mrs. Lee saw it only when he knelt to look under the piano in search of it.

  Charlotte Lee laughed and pulled the canvas from his clothes-leaving the print of a woman's face on the seat of his trousers. Scheibert tore out of the house and across the fields to camp, where he arrived roaring, waving his arms, and, overcome by mirth, tumbled on the grass where Stuart and the staff lay in the sunshine. Each time he turned over the officers saw the portrait on its white background, and howled with laughter.

  Scheibert was a sort of fat Don Quixote on horseback, for he was a beginning rider, and when he traveled, tied packages to his saddle; he rode with a flapping and jouncing of boxes, bags and objects of every sort, many of them dropping behind him. Scheibert once took the wrong road and galloped directly toward enemy lines with his pendant belongings, and when Stuart sent a rider to warn him, only spurred his horse in fear. When caught, he had scattered his goods over a wide area and exposed himself and an orderly to gunfire in collecting them.

  Such headquarters revelry was interrupted on April thirteenth.

  Stoneman's big cavalry corps gathered on the upper Rappahannock, threatening Kelly's Ford and a railroad bridge a few miles above. Stoneman had simple orders:

  Cross the river, drive off the Confederate cavalry at Culpeper, and ride eastward to get between Lee's army and Richmond. Burn supply depots and destroy Lee's lifeline, the Richmond and Fredericksburg Railroad.

  General Hooker would be at hand to supply the cavalry when rations ran out.

  The orders to Stoneman closed with an imperial flourish:

  It devolves upon you, General, to take the initiative in the forward movement of this grand army, and on you and your noble command must depend in a great measure the extent and brilliancy of our success. Bear in mind that celerity, audacity, and resolution are everything in war, and especially is it the case with the command you have and the enterprise upon which you are about to embark.

  But celerity, audacity and resolution deserted Stoneman's advance when the blue columns struck Stuart's tiny guard at the river crossings. So certain of success was Hooker that his big infantry corps in the rear cooked eight days' rations and prepared to move behind the cavalry. There was a fumbling start.

  Rooney Lee guarded Kelly's Ford with only two regiments, plus some 250 men of the 2nd North Carolina, more than half of these without horses and on foot.

  Stuart was called from "Camp Pelham" on April thirteenth and dashed to Kelly's Ford; it was all over when he arrived. The Federals had made a show of crossing at daylight, but retreated under sharp fire.

  There was more trouble upstream at the railroad bridge, where a small party manned rifle pits and a blockhouse. General Gregg's division approached and its advance crossed the river. The 9th Virginia charged the enemy, who astonishingly recrossed the stream.

  A few Federal parties crossed the next day and fought briefly with Stuart's outposts, but all retreated. The Rappahannock was now rising swiftly, and it appeared that the Union cavalry chief had lost an opportunity.

  President Lincoln telegraphed General Hooker on April fifteenth:

  General Stoneman is not moving rapidly enough to make the expedition come to anything. He has now been out three days, two of which were unusually fair weather, and all three without hindrance from the enemy, and yet he is not twenty-five miles from where he started. To reach his point he still has sixty miles to go, another river to cross, and will be hindered by the enemy. By arithmetic, how many days will it take him to do it? I do not know that any better can be done, but I greatly fear it is another failure already. Write me often, I am very anxious.

  Lincoln's fears were justified. He had developed at last a cavalry corps superior to Stuart's in numbers, equipment, horses, supply and arms. He had not yet found its match in bold leadership.

  Stoneman's failure gave the Confederates a respite of almost two weeks, for the Rappahannock surged high over its banks and made crossings perilous. Stuart's tents were often flooded and the staff miserable.

  It was April twenty-eighth when the blow fell at last. The big Federal army had covered Kelly's Ford and the railroad bridge nearby with infantry for several days, and now they moved. Von Borcke was shaken awake at three A.M. by Stuart, and the staff rode off, yawning. They found Fitz Lee's brigade in line at dawn, near Brandy Station. The enemy were entirely hidden by fog. There were sounds of regiments marching on pontoon bridges; scouts said bluecoats were pouring over.

  Stuart pulled his men into line in an effort to contain the big force—prisoners said 20,000 blue infantry had crossed and marched upriver, cutting off Kelly's Ford. One prisoner caught in the net was a blustering Belgian in Federal uniform who spoke French with von Borcke, and would say only, "Gentlemen, I can give you one piece of advice—that is, to try and make your escape as quickly as possible. If not, your capture by the large army in front of you is a certainty."

  Stuart soon found what the Belgian meant. Couriers brought the same news from all directions: Yankees were pouring over the river at every crossing. Stuart cut an infantry column near Madden's, and though he scattered it but briefly, found in his catch of prisoners men wearing the badges of three corps, the Fifth, Eleventh and Twelfth. The new Richmond offensive was on. Stuart telegraphed the word to Robert Lee.

  There was an immediate order in reply: Stuart would try to protect the railroads as best he could, but the main body of cavalry must retreat eastward and join the left flank of Confederate infantry.

  Lee was now moving into the gloomy thickets of The Wilderness, a tangle almost fifty miles square which lay in the path of the Federal columns. To complicate matters, Hooker was also crossing in force at Fredericksburg, and coming into line on the site of the battle of December. Lee was forced to leave a strong rear guard there. The infantry force he carried into The Wilderness was de-pressingly small, for Longstreet's corps was far away, at its post around Suffolk, in Tidewater Virginia.

  Stuart sent Fitz Lee's men, "in a jaded and hungry condition," to Raccoon Ford, which they would hold until infantry came to their aid. Rooney Lee's brigade went to the upper Rapidan to guard the railroad.

  Stuart went to the rear. Von Borcke wrote of it: "By the time we reached Raccoon Ford it was already dark. The night was wet and chilly, a fine sleet drizzling down incessantly; and we felt cold, hungry, and uncomfortable." They wound along the Orange Plank Road, which led from Germanna Ford to Chancellorsville, little more than a clearing in The Wilderness. They were on the road all night.

  The first graycoats to face the enemy were the 3rd Virginia, who met the 6th New York Cavalry in a brisk fight at Wilderness Run and fell back, fighting, toward Chancellorsville.

  Stuart was not far behind, in camp at Todd's Tavern. The bulk of the Federal cavalry had already left The Wilderness—on a raid in the rear, it was reported. Stuart had time to do no more than help save Lee's infantry; there was no hope of chasing Stoneman.

  Jeb was not long at Todd's Tavern. He called von Borcke and two or three others, including Captain Scheibert, and rode in the light of a new moon toward Robert Lee's headquarters at Spotsylvania Court House. Von Borcke urged him to take a cavalry escort, but Jeb refused:

  "It's only twelve miles. The roads are clear."

  They rode near enemy lines in the overgrown country, until a pistol popped ahead of them and a courier came back with the story that Yankees had fired on him. Stuart was incredulous. "You mistook some of our own men for them," he said. He sent von Borcke and another officer to investigat
e.

  A group of men in light blue overcoats sat horses in the road.

  "What regiment are you?" von Borcke yelled.

  Horses galloped. "You'll see soon enough, you damned Rebels!" Riders filled the road, and Stuart took his party into the underbrush. Von Borcke enjoyed seeing Stuart fly: "I had the pleasure of seeing our General, who had now lost all doubts as to the real character of these cavalrymen, for once run from the enemy."

  Jeb sent for help; Fitz Lee came in and cleared the roadway, but touch-and-go fighting lasted most of the night. Von Borcke sketched a skirmish:

  "General Stuart and his staff were trotting along at the head of the column, when, at the moment of emerging out of the dark forest, we suddenly discovered in the open field before us, and at a distance of not more than 160 yards, the long lines of several regiments of hostile cavalry."

  These lines fired, dropping men around the staff, but Jeb drew his saber and trotted toward the enemy, shouting to the troopers. "For once," the German recorded, "our horsemen refused to follow their gallant commander; they wavered under the thick storm of bullets; soon all discipline ceased, and the greater part of this splendid regiment... broke to the rear in utter confusion."

  Stuart, von Borcke and others tried vainly to stop it, but rallied only thirty men around them. The enemy drove them through The Wilderness, "a wild exciting chase, in which friend and foe, unable to recognize each other, mingled helter-skelter in one furious ride."

  Before they reached Lee's headquarters there were two or three more brushes, in one of which von Borcke got a bullet through his hat and lost a horse. He found a new mount, a tiny Federal pony with short legs almost covered by von Borcke's big English saddle, "leaving only his ears sticking out."

  Stuart was angry at the panic of his men, but laughed at sight of von Borcke on his new charger. At headquarters they learned that the enemy they had met in the darkness was the advance of the main Federal body, which now lay near Chancellorsville.4

  Evalina Wellford, who lived in this forest, had a premonition of terrors to come:

  The Yankees were down at the Furnace not a mile from us, shouting and shooting, and we four unprotected females every

  moment expecting their appearance at the house. As soon as they came so near, Uncle C. and Charlie made their escape to the woods, as certainly they would have been captured had they remained. We sat up all night looking for the Yankees, but they did not come till Friday morning, when about 20 visited us, searching the house for arms and Confederates, shooting the fowls and stealing provisions, of which we had a scant supply.

  Several who came behaved very well, and did us no harm whatever. They seemed confident of success, and thought Richmond was almost within their grasp. Of course we were amused at their boasting, and gave them to understand as much.

  On this Friday morning, May first, Robert Lee astonished Joseph Hooker; rather than falling back to Richmond, he had pushed his infantry toward Chancellorsville, and by eleven A.M. there was musketry in the dense woods. Lee sent Stuart's riders to the flanks of his line, and they probed through the brush, seeking a route for attack.

  Stuart ranged in the front during the morning and when the gray infantry stalled short of Chancellorsville and General McLaws called for a flank attack from the left, Stonewall Jackson got a message from Jeb:

  General: I am on a road running from Spotsylvania C. H. to Silvers, which is on Plank Road three miles below Chancellorsville. I will close in on the flank and help all I can when the ball opens.... May God grant us victory.

  Jackson's reply:

  I trust God will grant us a great victory. Keep closed on Chancellorsville.

  Jeb rode during the afternoon: Evalina Wellford saw the riders:

  We were looking forward to another anxious night, when to our great joy the glorious Confederates under Stuart came tramping by, on their way to meet the enemy.

  By four P.M. Stuart reached the iron works called Catherine Furnace, where he found Jackson, who with his dingy old Virginia

  Military Institute cap crushed down on his forehead stared through field glasses at the enemy. Cannon fire was dropping men of Major Beckham's battery of the Horse Artillery.

  Shells fell nearer the group in the clearing, and one burst over a gun crew, wounding all but one of its men.

  Captain Joe Morrison, Jackson's aide and brother-in-law, watched Jeb:

  "The Federals got the range. Stuart laughed and said it might be prudent of Jackson to retire from the guns."

  At that moment a fragment struck in the group behind Stuart. Channing Price fell to his horse's neck. His leg was shattered. "I saw the death pallor on his face as they took him from his horse," Morrison said.6

  But Price would not leave. Doctors found that no bones were broken, and the lieutenant insisted upon staying with Stuart. He kept up for a few minutes, then fainted in his saddle. Men carried him back to the home of Evelina Wellf ord; he was bleeding severely, but Stuart thought him in no danger.

  Jeb visited Price at night in the plantation house. He was shocked to find the boy so white. Price smiled at the staff officers, but was so weak that he could give only a weak squeeze of his hand in farewell. He died at midnight.

  Von Borcke said he was too grief-stricken to rest, but Evelina Wellf ord wrote:

  General Stuart and his staff remained until after breakfast next morning. They slept under the trees in the yard and seemed to have a good time.6

  But Stuart left the Wellford yard in the night. Fitz Lee's men had found the end of the Federal line, in a clearing. It had the look of a vulnerable spot, a flank "in the air." Stuart did not trust the news to a courier, but rode to Lee's headquarters near Chancellorsville, where he found a conference in progress.

  Lee and Jackson sat on cracker boxes in firelight, surrounded by their staffs, poring over a map.

  "Hooker's maneuvering in some way," Jackson said. "They won't be on this side the river tomorrow."

  Lee disagreed. "I hope you may be right, but I believe he will deliver his main attack here. He would not have gone to such lengths and then give up without effort."

  They had just sent two keen engineer officers into the brush to probe the front lines. Stuart made his report. Lee and Jackson turned to the map once more, and their fingers traced the route toward Wilderness Church, on the far left of their line.

  "Are there good roads? Can we pass guns?"

  Stuart did not know. He went off to investigate. In his absence Lee and Jackson made one of the war's most momentous decisions. Lee felt certain that Stuart, or someone, would find a way to the exposed enemy flank and make possible an audacious attack which might make the armies equal.

  "Jackson," Lee said, "how can we get at those people?"

  "You know best. Show me what to do and we will try to do it."

  Lee indicated a route sweeping to their left over country unmarked by roads. "General Stuart will cover your movement with his cavalry."

  Jackson stood and gave an awkward salute. "My troops will move at four o'clock."

  Somewhere in the night Stuart found Jackson's chief chaplain, the Reverend B. T. Lacy, who had lived in the area and knew it intimately. He sent Lacy to headquarters, where the preacher roused Jackson. When Stonewall learned that Charles Wellford and his family could act as guides, he sent Lacy and his map maker, Jed Hotchkiss, to find them.

  Lacy and Hotchkiss were back at dawn, and Hotchkiss sketched new lines on his battle map. The Wellfords had indicated an old wagon road by the iron furnace, which ran around the Federal position to Wilderness Corner. It was passable to guns—in short, a perfect solution. General Lee heard the last of the explanation and drew up a cracker box beside Jackson.

  "General Jackson, what do you propose to do?"

  "Go around here," Stonewall said, moving his finger on Hotch-kiss's map.

  "And what do you propose to make this movement with?" "With my whole corps."

  Onlookers saw no hesitation in Lee. "And what will y
ou leave me?"

  "The divisions of Anderson and McLaws." "Well, go on."

  The flank sweep would leave Lee with some 14,000 troops to face Hooker's host, which might be as large as 100,000. But Lee's calm was unstudied as he watched Jackson leave to get his men under way. Not long after the sun rose, Jackson and Lee parted for the last time, at the roadside where Stonewall's troops marched.7

  Lee sent a message to President Davis in Richmond:

  I am now swinging around to my left to come up in his rear.

  Lee made a show of strength on his front during the day and waited. An enemy attack struck Jackson's rear, but the sounds soon died away. The Federals had evidently concluded that the column was retreating. The day grew hot.

  Jackson's men shrugged out of their coats and thronged the few springs they passed on their twelve-mile march. They did not go fast enough for Jackson, whose physician, Dr. Hunter McGuire, saw him with concern: "Never can I forget the eagerness and intensity of Jackson on that march. . . . His face was pale, his eyes flashing. Out from his thin compressed lips came the terse command: Tress forward! Press forward!' " Many men fell out, in spasms and fainting spells.

  The cavalry led the column. Von Borcke and his friends knew nothing of the object of the march, but did not think of questioning Jackson's lead: "We marched silently along through the forest, taking a small by-road, which brought us several times so near the enemy's lines that the strokes of axes, mingled with the hum of voices from their camps, was distinctly audible."