If the South Had Won the Civil War, Page 2

  An abortive attack on the city of Jackson, a delayed attempt to cut the railroad near Clinton, the final debacle at Champion’s Hill: these were as much—or even more—a result of bad generalship on the Union side as they were of the wisdom of Johnston’s over-all strategy and Pemberton’s willingness to comply. Federal forces were depleted almost daily—frittered away in costly battles which should have been mere touch-and-go skirmishes. The slightest penetration of strong Confederate defenses seemed, to McClernand, sufficient excuse to throw in a few brigades in a foolish attempt to hold and solidify a position palpably untenable in the end.

  Quickly the problem of supply became acute: the Federals were starving in the field. When at last the citizen-soldier had exhibited his faults in repeated demonstrations sufficient for even a Halleck to understand, it was too late for Sherman, the new commander, to salvage even a crumb of victory. The Northerners must seek their supply lines again or they would perish where they stood.

  Humiliated and embittered, Sherman withdrew to the Mississippi, with Logan’s Division of the Seventeenth Corps sacrificing heavily in a rearguard action which insured the escape of the main columns. A month to the day from that May 7th when U. S. Grant, living and intent, had cut loose from Grand Gulf, the retreating Army of the Tennessee was back on the banks of the big river—mauled, hungry, and the poorer by at least twelve thousand casualties.

  Through the hot month of June the star of the Confederates scintillated into a new ascendancy, the star of the North declined. Doggedly Sherman clung to that belief he embraced the year before, and which also had been a conviction of the now-vanished Grant: Vicksburg could be reduced only by a land army operating from the land, and any attack by naval vessels would be fruitless. Still, if Sherman were to achieve a satisfactory base on the high ground of Walnut Hills, north of Vicksburg, he must in effect reverse his field, ferry across the Mississippi once more, and return to Milliken’s Bend, and, eventually, to the east shore. This was the movement carried out; but in a fatal midnight the steamers which sought to run up the river past Vicksburg were not charmed as they seemed to have been when they puffed south in April. Vessel after vessel was set afire or sunk by Confederate batteries. Strangely enough this disaster occurred only a few hours before Major General Nathaniel P. Banks made his ill-conceived assault on the works at Port Hudson, in Louisiana, to be thrown back with appalling waste.

  On Friday, June 26th, Sherman, reinforced at last by the survivors of Banks’ command, had recrossed the Mississippi and was in position for the assault. Percentage-wise, the Army of the Tennessee then suffered the most severe losses of any command, North or South, during the war. Five hours after the initial attack was launched, Union regiments were being commanded by lieutenants, army divisions by colonels; and there had ensued no permanent breach of the Confederate works. The next day Johnston crossed the Big Black River; Sunday afternoon he fell upon the Federal flank and rear. (During the first hour of Johnston’s attack, J. B. McPherson, a future President of the United States, was seriously wounded.) On Monday morning Pemberton sallied forth from Vicksburg, and the Army of the Tennessee was trapped against the Mississippi shore. The surrender came on Tuesday, the last day of a miserable month for the Federals.

  William Tecumseh Sherman was not present to deliver the surrender. The turbulent but dedicated commander risked fire once too often. An anonymous sharpshooter had drilled his red head the previous afternoon.

  * * *

  It is not likely that one in a hundred either of the defeated or the victorious troops at Vicksburg had ever heard of another burg: a place called Gettysburg.

  Nor was the name of that little Pennsylvania town commonly recognized by people in the Army of the Potomac, or in the Army of Northern Virginia. Those soldiers learned about Gettysburg (many of them to their dismay or extinction) on July 1st, while the once proud Army of the Tennessee was still signing its parole beside the Mississippi.

  There could be little purpose in reciting in detail the events of that first day’s battle. A fumbling encounter near Willoughby Run before the sun was high—the rush of the Union First Corps into battle against Lieutenant General A. P. Hill, the death of Major General John F. Reynolds, a hasty forward movement of the Union Eleventh Corps, the jar as Lieutenant General Richard S. Ewell struck them, the dissolution of the Federal lines at mid-afternoon—These are matters of common knowledge.

  But what is not realized too generally is the fact that, despite the flight of disordered Federal forces through the village of Gettysburg, despite their heavy loss in prisoners, despite a solely precarious hold which elements of the First and Eleventh Corps obtained on the Cemetery Hill south of town— Despite these gains, it would have been wholly possible for General Robert E. Lee to have lost the battle or to have begun losing it, about five P.M. that afternoon.

  Many of Lee’s biographers believe that the events of the next hour went as far toward altering the course of America’s history as any single hour might go.

  Lee’s attitude was a marvel to those about him. He was decisive, incisive; and the orders which he issued brooked no misinterpretation. Colonel Kenneth Reidun-Clarke, who was an observer in the field and later wrote a definitive history of the War for Southern Independence,* says: “In many previous circumstances which might be considered similar, there had been a tendency toward ambiguity manifest in General Lee. This I did not observe to be the case at Gettysburg. He said quietly: ‘The enemy is there, and I will attack him now.’ Frequently it seemed that I had detected in the orders issued by Lee to his subordinates an over-willingness to allow those subordinates to exercise their own discretion. Had, for instance, the commander of the Army of Northern Virginia suggested to Ewell that he should attack the Federals in their new position only if it seemed to him to be practicable, or only if in considered judgment he felt it wise, there might have been a different story to relate, and quite another ending to the battle at Gettysburg. But this was not the case: no one could have misunderstood the desires of Lee. He wished to press an advantage already gained, and would not be deterred.”

  Ewell’s Corps, having joined battle much later than Hill’s, was infinitely fresher. Brigadier General Alfred Iverson’s and Brigadier General Junius Daniel’s brigades moved rapidly to the base of Cemetery Hill, where they encountered the ineffectual fire of a Yankee skirmish line. These skirmishers had been thrown out only a few minutes earlier by Major General W. S. Hancock, who had just arrived on the hill, far in advance of his own Second Corps (and was instructed by Meade to survey the situation).

  Hancock announced to Major General Oliver Howard that he would assume command; but met with objections of the Eleventh Corps Commander, who insisted that he was the senior in rank. Hancock then replied that he would leave at once and make a personal report to Major General George G. Meade. But Howard was reluctant to agree to this also, declaring: “I need you here to assist in forming these lines.”

  In soldierly manner Hancock agreed, and endeavored to bring order out of chaos. He might indeed have succeeded in his efforts had Ewell delayed in attacking the hill. Hancock threw out a skirmish line (as noted in the foregoing) and also attempted to establish a brigade on Culp’s Hill on the Union right.

  The demoralization of the Union forces was so acute that Hancock met with great difficulty in identifying or assembling a full brigade for this purpose. Thus a random selection of broken and disorganized regiments, including troops of both the First and the Eleventh Corps, were told off for this task and moved at once toward Culp’s Hill.

  They had but entered the valley lying between the two eminences when they were struck on their left by Major General Jubal A. Early’s Division. Simultaneously, on the Confederate right, Major General W. D. Pender’s Division of Hill’s Corps moved against the west slope of the Cemetery Hill, Brigadier General Samuel McGowan’s and Brigadier General Alfred M. Scales’ brigades leading on. This was an attack of Carolinians almost without exception, save for the crushing a
ssault by Early on the Confederate left.

  Already the Confederate artillery was shelling roads behind the cemetery, and inflicting casualties on advance elements of the Union Twelfth Corps, who were just moving in from Littlestown. The feeble and exhausted lines of skirmishers were slain, captured or overrun within a matter of minutes, and Major General Robt. E. Rode’s and Pender’s Divisions forced their way triumphantly into the cemetery. Fierce hand-to-hand fighting raged among the tombstones. But the issue could no longer be in doubt: the battered Eleventh Corps—or rather the survivors of that much-mauled organization—gave way rapidly, and blundered toward the rear in a panic not unlike that endured at Chancellorsville.

  Even at this late hour the heat of the day was exhausting, both to attackers and defenders; but the morale of the victorious Confederates seemed to be giving them an added transfusion of vigor.

  Long before dusk, Ewell, together with Pender’s Division, was firmly established on both the Cemetery Hill and Culp’s Hill. The remnants of the right wing of the Army of the Potomac stumbled in flight down the Baltimore Pike or along the road leading south to Taneytown.

  Lee had ridden out of town to his right, in order to observe the battle more clearly. A report reached him that Hancock had just been captured, seriously wounded. “See that he is made as comfortable as possible,” Lee instructed an orderly, and then he took up his glasses for another examination of the field. He lowered the glasses. Colonel Reidun-Clarke insists that Lee said quietly, as if to himself, “I didn’t know Dick Ewell could move so rapidly.”

  * * *

  A noted historian of the Southern Revolution, H. H. Pettigrew* (1870–1946: son of Johnston Pettigrew, a Confederate general officer) has examined those elements contributing to the success of the Confederates at Gettysburg and during the battles which followed as victorious gray armies thundered once more into Maryland. Pettigrew considers the fact that Lee observed the importance of two hills at the southern prolongation of the Cemetery Ridge—i.e., Little Round Top and Round Top—and immediately gave orders for their occupation, to be a positive circumstance in the determination of a Confederate victory. This was the entering wedge by which Lee drove his forces between scattered Union army corps and sent them sprawling.

  But almost of equal effect might be considered the shrewdness and audacity displayed by Major General J. E. B. Stuart in flinging his cavalry against Major General Alfred Pleasanton’s cavalry in the early morning of July 2nd. A less able general might have ignored Pleasanton’s very existence, after a preliminary brush with the Federal cavalry on the outskirts of Hanover two days earlier. If Stuart had progressed northeasterly toward York, or perhaps northwesterly in the direction of Carlisle, the Army of Northern Virginia would have been bereft of his services at a time when they were needed urgently. With Pleasanton’s forces mainly scattered and reeling in defeat, Stuart achieved his first contact with the bulk of the Confederate Army since he left Virginia.

  Equally dramatic, if not equally decisive, was the forced march made from the Chambersburg region by Major General George E. Pickett’s Division of Lieutenant General James Longstreet’s Corps, and the introduction—after a much-needed few hours of sleep—of a large body of fresh troops unwearied by participation in previous fighting. Also there must be taken into consideration the indecisiveness of General Meade, and the poor staff work which ruled: corps commanders not knowing the location of other corps—uncertainty about the choosing of defensive positions—an utter lack of intercommunication and liaison among the Federal units.

  With both the Taneytown road and the Emmitsburg road tightly in his grasp, Lee mauled his way down into Maryland, crushing the Northern forces in detail. After a single bitter and bloody encounter, Major General Daniel E. Sickles managed to escape with the greater portion of his Third Corps, and swing rapidly to the East; but most other bodies of National troops were not so fortunate.

  Stuart’s cavalry deployed to attack Federal elements from the rear, and became an integral factor in the demolishing of the Union Second Corps. In piecemeal fashion, the Union Fifth and Sixth Corps were broken to bits before they could assume proper defensive positions on Pipe Creek; nor could they effectually unite with the survivors of proceeding battles.

  By sunset on July 3rd, the Army of the Potomac had dissolved into hopeless tatters—bleeding human garbage, a pitiful mockery of an army. Brigade after brigade was cut off. Many surrendered intact; others, resisting frantically, and often without sufficient ammunition, were annihilated. Lee attempted to appeal to Meade for a surrender which would bring an end to this slaughter; but he had much difficulty in communicating with the Union commander, or even in discovering his whereabouts. It was the saddest Fourth of July in United States history.

  Panic ruled in Philadelphia, Baltimore, in New York City, and, of course, in Washington. News of the military tragedies which had affected the National Government in two widely-separated areas, plunged the entire North into either hysteria or paralysis. In Baltimore and New York, as well as in Chicago, droves of hoodlums—professing Southern sympathies, but impelled principally by a desire for anarchistic saturnalia—seized the city offices. They looted and burned at will, and were routed only when Federal troops moved against them with artillery.

  This was not merely defeat. It was a disaster of such magnitude that many Southern leaders pleaded for a compassion which would not make America into an object of disgust and derision before the civilized world.

  In Washington, the so-called contrabands, who had drifted into the District of Columbia region as a result of the war, and who dwelt in the new Arlington camp or were employed in the capital—These colored unfortunates rioted past the unsteady troops who guarded them, attempting to flee, they knew not where. Rumors of “slave insurrection” and “black rebellionists” fluttered through the streets, and here again the criminal element achieved mastery. Not only in Washington, but in other principal cities throughout the North, hundreds of Negroes were hounded through the alleys, had their brains bashed out by cobblestones, were hanged, burned, torn to pieces, just as rapidly as they fell into the hands of maniacal mobs. Not only the army, not only the structure of government, but the soul and body of the Nation seemed to be falling apart.

  July turned unseasonably chilly following torrential rains in the Washington, D.C. region on the 3rd and 4th.

  By Monday evening, Ward Hill Lamon, the President’s close personal friend, and Marshal of the District of Columbia, was obsessed by fears for Mr. Lincoln’s safety. Twice during the day lawless crowds had endeavored to storm into the White House, and were driven back by bayonets of the infantry on guard.

  Lamon himself disappeared from the scene before sunset, and did not return for nearly three hours. A rumor had reached him and he wanted to explore it.

  When Lamon returned to the White House, where he had been in residence since the first news of military calamities arrived (each night he had slept with loaded pistols beside him, on a rug outside the President’s door), he was accompanied by half a dozen horsemen who wore mackintosh capes over their other clothing. The little cavalcade was followed closely by a large van used for delivery of ice during the summer months; but two New York cavalrymen occupied the driver’s seat.

  Marshal Lamon entered the White House, while his unidentified companions waited in shadows outside the west door. According to a later statement made by the marshal, he found President Lincoln lying on a sofa, sole alone, in the darkened East Room. The President had a severe headache, and a damp handkerchief was folded across his eyes.

  Lamon’s first words brought Abraham Lincoln to his feet. “You shan’t stay here an hour longer! I can’t be responsible for your safety if you remain—no one could.”

  The President smiled bleakly. “Just where might we go? The railroads to the North are cut, and you tell me that all of Maryland is in revolt.”

  “True, true,” cried Lamon impatiently, “but I have other plans for you.”

  �
�Well, Hill, I have news for you as well: I am going no place.”

  The mighty Lamon took a deep breath. “You will go if I have to pick you up in my arms and carry you. Go—if I have to clout you over the head and render you unconscious! I have already informed Mrs. Lincoln and Bob, and they’re preparing for a journey. If you persist in being stubborn,” Lamon finally exploded, “you’ll have to answer to her, as well as to me.”

  Lamon said later that the President made his way upstairs without another word. Lamon watched him go, then hastened outside to make arrangements.

  Raggle-taggle throngs were still clustered beyond the fence north of the White House, facing Lafayette Park. From the park itself rose the scream and mumble of crowds surrounding a couple of speakers who ranted on barrelheads in the glow of torchlight.

  Lamon personally superintended the removal of some settees and hassocks, which were placed in the back of the ice-van. Then he reached the stairway in time to meet Mrs. Lincoln, who came down, sobbing wildly, with ten-year-old Tad clinging to her. Several servants carried a mass of luggage. Lamon knew well enough that there would be no room for such weighty impedimenta; but, in the wisdom of long experience, he said nothing to the President’s wife. He drew her maid aside and ordered that only the most necessary bags be carried out. Robert Lincoln came from his room a moment later and escorted his weeping mother and little brother to the west door.

  Lamon stood waiting for the President. When Mr. Lincoln appeared he was wearing a shabby old overcoat and toying with a crushed felt hat which he held in his hands.

  “Hill,” he said to Lamon, “remember how I wore these duds when I came into Washington, before the Inauguration?”