From Manassas to Appomattox. James Longstreet

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СКАЧАТЬ his first lieutenant relations of confidence and esteem, official and personal, which ripened into stronger ties as the mutations of war bore heavier upon us. He always invited the views of the latter in moves of strategy and general policy, not so much for the purpose of having his own views approved and confirmed as to get new light, or channels for new thought, and was more pleased when he found something that gave him new strength than with efforts to evade his questions by compliments. When oppressed by severe study, he sometimes sent for me to say that he had applied himself so closely to a matter that he found his ideas running around in a circle, and was in need of help to find a tangent. Our personal relations remained as sincere after the war until politics came between us in 1867.

      General Pope was industriously increasing his strength. The Ninth Corps, General Burnside, had been ordered to Fredericksburg via Acquia Creek, and a division under General Reno of eight thousand of that corps reported to the commander at Culpeper Court-House on the 14th. Besides reinforcements called to support him from General McClellan’s army, Pope was authorized to call to his aid the greater part of the army in West Virginia under General Cox.

      After reaching Gordonsville and learning something of the position of the armies, and more of the features of the country, it occurred to me that a move against General Pope’s right would give us vantage-ground for battle and pursuit, besides the inviting foot-hills of the Blue Ridge for strategy, and this preference was expressed to General Lee.43 He joined us on the 15th, and the brigades, including those under Hood, were advanced to position for a general march. He thought it better to strike in between General Pope’s left and the reinforcements that could join him from Fredericksburg than to adopt the proposition to move his army by the upper fords of the Rapidan and strike down upon the enemy’s right, and decided to throw his right wing forward by the Raccoon Ford, and his left by the Somerville Ford, the latter above the railroad,—Fitzhugh Lee and Robertson’s cavalry with his right, and T. T. Munford’s with the left wing; General Stuart with the column on the right.

      My command marched on the 16th to position for crossing by the lower fords. Jackson was in position for the upper crossings. As all of the cavalry was not up, General Lee ordered his march for the 18th, to give time for the arrival of General Stuart and his marching troopers.

      Leaving the cavalry on the march, under General Fitzhugh Lee, with instructions to camp on the plank-road opposite Raccoon Ford on the 17th, General Stuart rode on the cars to General Lee’s head-quarters, received his orders, and rode out on the plank-road to join his command under Fitzhugh Lee, then due. The latter, however, “by failure to comply with instructions,” as his commander expressed it subsequently, lost a day in a roundabout ride, which so jaded his horses that another day was sacrificed to give them rest. As if this were not sufficient misfortune, Captain Fitzhugh (General J. E. B. Stuart’s adjutant) was captured, and, as a crowning disaster, the despatch of the Confederate commander giving instructions for the march of his army as ordered for the 18th was lost. The despatch was taken to General Pope, who, thus advised by accident, immediately set about retiring from Culpeper to the east bank of the Rappahannock. General Pope reported that

      “The cavalry expedition sent out on the 16th in the direction of Louisa Court-House captured the adjutant-general of General Stuart, and was very near capturing that officer himself. Among the papers taken was an autograph letter of General Robert E. Lee to General Stuart, dated Gordonsville, August 15, which made manifest to me the position and force of the army, and their determination to overwhelm the army under my command before it could be reinforced by any portion of the Army of the Potomac.”44

      Thus on that day Pope put his army in retreat by the several crossings of the Rappahannock to its strong camps of the north side, leaving his cavalry in observation.

      As Fitzhugh Lee’s cavalry failed to get to position on my right on the 17th, I ordered two regiments of infantry to be posted as guard on the road to Raccoon Ford until the cavalry could relieve them. The detail fell upon Toombs’s brigade. As we were to be in wait during the 17th, General Toombs rode off that morning to visit an old Congressional friend, and was absent when the order was received at his brigade head-quarters. The detail was filled by his next in rank, Colonel H. L. Benning, and duly posted. On his return, General Toombs rode upon his picket, claimed that his troops should not have been moved except by orders through himself, and ordered the detail back to their camps. Upon learning of General Stuart’s mishap, and the ride of the Federal cavalry by Raccoon Ford, I sent to inquire how the cavalry happened to escape my picket-guard. Finding that the troops had been ordered off by General Toombs, the chief of staff was directed to put on his sword and sash and order him under arrest. Afterwards he was ordered to the rear, to confine himself to the limits of Gordonsville.

      In addition to Reno’s command, Stevens’s division of the Ninth Corps joined General Pope on the 15th. On the 17th, Reno sent out a party of two hundred and fifty men and captured Jackson’s signal-station on Clarke’s Mountain; and it appears from the official report of this occurrence that the Federals were misinformed as to our position, and that up to the receipt of the captured despatch, General Pope knew nothing of the arrival of the troops of my command.

      On the 18th report came from Clarke’s Mountain of unusual stir in the Federal commands about Culpeper Court-House, and General Lee sent for me to ride with him to the mountain to observe the movements. From the summit we had a fair view of many points, and the camp-flags, as they opened their folds to the fitful breezes, seemed to mark places of rest. Changing our glasses to the right and left and rear, the white tops of army wagons were seen moving. Half an hour’s close watch revealed that the move was for the Rappahannock River. Changing the field of view to the bivouacs, they seemed serenely quiet, under cover from the noonday August sun. As we were there to learn from personal observation, our vigilance was prolonged until the wagons rolled down the declivities of the Rappahannock. Then, turning again to view the bivouacs, a stir was seen at all points. Little clouds of dust arose which marked the tramp of soldiers, and these presently began to swell into dense columns along the rearward lines. Watching without comment till the clouds grew thinner and thinner as they approached the river and melted into the bright haze of the afternoon sun, General Lee finally put away his glasses, and with a deeply-drawn breath, expressive at once of disappointment and resignation, said, “General, we little thought that the enemy would turn his back upon us thus early in the campaign.”

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