In
April, 1863, General Joseph
Hooker, the commander of the Army of the Potomac,
decided to attack the Army of Northern Virginia that had been entrenched
on the south side of the Rappahonnock River since the battle of Fredericksburg.
Hooker and his 130,000 strong army crossed the river and took up position
at Chancellorsville.
Although outnumbered two to one, Robert E.
Lee, opted to split his Confederate Army
into two groups. Lee left 10,000 men under Jubal
Early, while on 2nd May, he sent Thomas
Stonewall Jackson to attacked the flank of Hooker's army. The
attack was successful but after returning from the battlefield Jackson
was accidentally shot by one of his own men. Jackson's left arm was
successfully amputated but he developed pneumonia
and he died eight days later.
On the 3rd May, James Jeb Stuart, who
had taken command of Jackson's troops, mounted another attack
and drove Joseph
Hooker back further. The following day Robert
E. Lee and Jubal
Early and joined the attack on the Union
Army. By 6th May, Hooker had lost over 11,000 men, and decided
to retreat from the area.
(1)
General
Joseph
Hooker,
statement issued to
his men before the battle of Chancellorsville (1st May, 1863)
It
is with heartfelt satisfaction that the commanding general announces
to the army that the operations of the last three days have determined
that our enemy must ingloriously fly, or come out from behind his
defenses and give us battle on our own ground, where certain destruction
awaits him - the operations of the Fifth, Eleventh, and Twelfth Corps
have been a succession of splendid achievements
(2)
In his autobiography, Major General Carl Schurz,
wrote how the senior officers reacted when Joseph
Hooker
predicted an easy victory over Robert
E. Lee at Chancellorsville.
They hoped indeed that the Army of
the Potomac, 130,000 strong, would prove able to beat Lee's army,
only 60,000 strong. But it jarred upon their feelings as well as their
good sense to hear their commanding general gasconade do boastfully
of having the enemy in the hollow of his hand - that enemy being Robert
E. Lee at the head of the best infancy in the world. Still we all
hoped, and we explored the map for the important strategical point
we would strike the next day. but the "next day" brought
us a fearful disappointment.
(3)
The journalist, Henry
Villard, met General
Joseph
Hooker
just before the battle at Chancellorsville. He wrote about the meeting
in his book, Memoirs of Henry Villard (1904).
His exterior was certainly most attractive
and commanding. He was fully six feet high, finely proportioned, with
a soldierly, erect carriage, handsome and noble features, a slight
fringe of side-whiskers, a rosy complexion, abundant blond hair, a
fine and expressive mouth, and, most striking of all, great, speaking
grey-blue eyes. He looked, indeed, like the ideal soldier and captain,
fit for a model of a war-god.
He had even then an unenviable notoriety for a rash tongue, to which
he added lamentably in his subsequent career. He burst forth into
unsparing criticism of the general conduct of the war, of the government,
of Halleck, McClellan and Pope. His language was so severe and, at
the same time, so infused with self-assertion as to give rise immediately
to a fear on my part that he might be inclined to make use of me for
his own glorification and for the detraction of others.
(4)
Major General Carl Schurz, wrote about
the battle at Chancellorsville
in
his autobiography published in 1906.
On Friday, May 1st, our columns,
advancing toward Fredericksburg, met the opposing enemy. Hooker recoiled
and ordered his army back into a defensive position, there to await
Lee's attack. Thus the offensive campaign so brilliantly opened was
suddenly transformed into a defensive one. hooker had surrendered
the initiative of movement, and given to Lee the incalculable advantage
of perfect freedom of action. Lee could fall fall back in good order
upon his lines of communication with Richmond, if he wished, or he
could concentrate his forces, or so much of them as he saw fit, upon
any part of Hooker's defensive position which he might think most
advantageous to himself to attack.
(5)
General
Oliver
Howard
took part in the battle of Chancellorsville
and later wrote about it in his autobiography published
in 1907.
Chancellorsville was a dreadful field. The
dead were strewn through forest and open farms. The wounded had often
to wait for days before succor came. Sometimes it never came. One
officer on my personal staff, Captain F. Dessaur, was killed while
near me beside Barlow's entrenchments, endeavoring to rally the panic-stricken
men. His young wife had besought him to resign and come home to Brooklyn,
New York, before the battle commenced. He tendered his resignation,
explaining the peculiar circumstances of the case. But we were before
the enemy, and soon to be engaged in battle, so that I wrote my disapproval
upon his application. Poor fellow, he was slain, and my heart was
deeply pained at his loss and in sympathy with his stricken family.
Dessaur is an example of that dreadful sacrifice made in the cause
of our national unity and of human liberty.
It has been customary to
blame me and my corps for the disaster. The imputations of neglect
to obey orders; of extraordinary self-confidence; of fanatical reliance
upon the God of battles; of not sending out reconnaissances; of not
intrenching; of not strengthening the right dank by keeping proper
reserves; of having no pickets and skirmishers; of not sending information
to General Hooker, etc., etc., are far from true. My command was by
positive orders riveted to that position. Though constantly threatened
and made aware of hostile columns in motion, yet the woods were so
dense that Stonewall Jackson was able to mass a large force a few
miles off, whose exact whereabouts neither patrols, reconnaissances,
nor scouts ascertained. The enemy crossing the plank road, two and
a half miles off, we all saw. So the turning at the Furnace was seen
by hundreds of our people; but the interpretation of these movements
was certainly wrong. Yet, wherein did we neglect any precaution? It
will be found that Devens kept his subordinates constantly on the
qui vive; so did Schurz. Their actions and mine were identical. The
Eleventh Corps detained Jackson for over an hour; part of my force
was away by Hooker's orders; part of each division fought hard, as
our Confederate enemies clearly show; part of it became wild with
panic, like the Belgians at Waterloo, like most of our troops at Bull
Run, and the Confederates, the second day, at Fair Oaks.
I may leave the whole matter
to the considerate judgment of my companions in arms, simply asserting
that on the terrible day of May 2, 1863, I did all which could have
been done by a corps commander in the presence of that panic of men
largely caused by the overwhelming attack of Jackson's 26,000 men
against my isolated corps of 8,000 without its reserve thus outnumbering
me 3 to 1.
There is always a theory
in war which will to rest all the imputation of blame to those who
do not deserve it. It is to impute the credit of one's great defeat
to his enemy. I think in our hearts, as we take a candid review of
everything that took place under General Hooker in the blind wilderness
country around Chancellorsville, we do, indeed, impute our primary
defeat to the successful effort of Stonewall Jackson, and our other
checks to General Robert E. Lee.
(6)
In his diary Walt
Whitman
recorded the arrival of the wounded from the battle of Chancellorsville
(May, 1863)
The wounded have begun to arrive
from Hooker's command from bloody Chancellorsville. I was down among
the first arrivals. The men in charge told me the bad cases were yet
to come. If that is so I pity them, for these are bad enough. You
ought to see the scene of the wounded arriving on the landing here
at the foot of Sixth Street, at night. Two boat loads came about half-past
seven last night. the pale, helpless soldiers had been debarked, and
lay around on the wharf and neighborhood anywhere. The rain was, probably,
grateful to them; at any rate they were exposed to it. The few torches
light up the spectacle. All round - on the wharf, on the ground, out
on side places - the men are lying on blankets, old quilts, etc.,
with bloody rags bound round heads, arms, and legs.
The attendants are few, and at night few outsiders also - only a few
hard-worked transportation men and drivers. The wounded are getting
to be common, and people grow callous. The men, whatever their condition,
lie there, and patiently wait till their turn comes to be taken up.
The men generally make little or do ado, whatever their sufferings.
A few groans that cannot be suppressed, and occasionally a scream
of pain as they lift a man into the ambulance. Today, as I write,
hundreds more are expected, and tomorrow and the next day more, and
so on for many days. Quite often they arrive at the rate of 1000 a
day.
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