Day 67. May 6, 1862.
67
men as if they were insects….
May Tuesday 6th 1862
Quite cool this morning. Some little rain last night and this morning. We had to change our camp nearer to the Artillary. We have a fine location. The water is handy and the ground is fine for camping purpose. The three companys are back working on the Pike D. I. F. The day was fine. I was over on the hill above our left Battarie’s are they have a good possition. Our men built a bridge over the creek last night. We have our Tents up today and getting fixed up some little. I don’t know of anything new. We are expecting to draw Jackson back so we may have a fight with him but he has thought that it might be a Winchester fight and I think that it would have been worse
Note: 1864
This Hallowed Ground: The Story of the Union Side of the Civil War Bruce Catton P. 323
“The woods took fire, helpless wounded men were burned to death, and wood smoke mingled with the smoke from the rifles to create a choking, blinding gloom. Night came at last, and the wild tempo of battle became slower; yet some of the men who fought in the Wilderness felt that the fighting never actually stopped all night long, and there were nervous outbursts of firing at intervals all up and down the lines. Off to the rear, such batteries as had been able to get into position sent shells over at random all through the night, and there was a constant shuffling movement of troops as brigade and division commanders tried desperately to pull their fighting lines together.
The battle flamed up in full strength as soon as daylight came.”
Note: It’s over, it’s over, but no; fuselage just keeps coming toward the sky to scratch that down also, charred noon & nothing to run toward or from. All the while a demonic tom-cat caterwaul that’s a crackling seance. They’ll crawl along the ground, a large flightless bird. Manged. Praise the Lord & pass the ammo. All the eyes swelled right out of heads, bodies becoming twice their original size. Some soldiers kill themselves before the fire reaches them. Others, their ammunition they had around them explodes. Instantly fatal. And of course they are discovered in whatever position, how they were sitting or laying, in the last moments, & it was not unusual to find Northern bodies totally stripped. The Dead Naked Yankees. The Wilderness was the 5th most costly battle in the war.
Shelby Foote:
“Grant in the Wilderness, after that first night in the Wilderness, went to his tent, broke down, and cried very hard. Some of the staff members said they’d never seen a man so unstrung. Well, he didn’t cry until the battle was over, and he wasn’t crying when it began again the next day. It just shows you the tension that he lived with without letting it affect him… Grant, he’s wonderful.”
The Shenandoah Campaign of 1862 Edited by Gary W. Gallagher P. 119
“There on May 6 Johnson’s force united with the army of Maj. Gen. Thomas “Stonewall” Jackson. Jackson hoped that the combined force could turn westward to strike a blow at the advance elements of a Union command under Maj. Gen. John C. Frémont, then march back into the Shenandoah Valley to face another Federal army under Maj. Gen. Nathaniel O. Banks. Because of Edward Johnson’s familiarity with the mountainous region, his two brigades led the Confederate advance against Frémont.”
Make Me a Map of the Valley: The Civil War Journal of Stonewall Jackson’s Topographer Jedediah Hotchkiss P. 37
“Tuesday, May 6th. We found that the enemy had left their camp at Cross’. We then rode on to Staunton, by way of the Parkersburg road and reported to Gen. Jackson. We heard that Banks had left Harrison and retreated down the Valley after plundering the people. A fine spring day and the farmers are planting corn.”
A Diary From Dixie Mary Boykin Chesnut P. 148
(Note: excerpt from entry May 6, 1862)
“Richmond was hard pressed this day. The Mercury of today says, “Jeff Davis now treats all men as if they were insects.”
It is this giving up that kills me. Norfolk they talk of now; why not Charleston* next? I read in a Western letter, “Not Beauregard, but the soldiers who stopped to drink the whisky they had captured from the enemy, lost us Shiloh.”’
Note: This man needs a tranquilizer dart. Anyway, Longstreet on the rumor men at Marye’s Hill, or Marye’s Heights (during the Battle of Fredericksburg December 11-15, 1862, but specifically on the 13th) were drunk:
Touched by Fire: The Best of Battles and Leaders of the Civil War Harold Holzer P. 479
THE BATTLE OF FREDERICKSBURG.
James Longstreet, Lieutenant-General, C.S.A.
“It has been reported that the troops attacking Marye’s Hill were intoxicated, having been plied with whisky to nerve them to the desperate attack. That can hardly be true. I know nothing of the facts, but no sensible commander will allow his troops strong drink upon going into battle. After a battle is over, the soldier’s gill is usually allowed if it is at hand. No troops could have displayed greater courage and resolution than was shown by those brought against Marye’s Hill. But they miscalculated the wonderful strength of the line behind the stone fence. The position held by Cobb surpassed courage and resolution, and was occupied by those who knew well how to hold a comfortable defense.”
The Myth of the Lost Cause and Civil War History Gary W. Gallagher and Alan T. Nolan, Editors (2000) P. 163 “Continuous Hammering and Mere Attrition.” Brooks D. Simpson
“Grant: “Ifs defeated the Confederates at Shiloh. There is little doubt that we would have been disgracefully beaten if all the shells and bullets fired by us had passed harmlessly over the enemy and if all of theirs had taken effect.’”
In Their Own Words: Civil War Commanders Collected and Edited by T.J. Stiles P. 276-277
From the Wilderness to Petersburg
By General U.S. Grant
“At 4:15 Lee attacked our left. His line moved up to within a hundred yards of ours and opened a heavy fire. This status was maintained for about half an hour. Then a part of Mott’s division and Ward’s brigade of Birney’s division gave way and retired in disorder. The enemy under R.H. Anderson took advantage of this and pushed through our line, planting their flags** on a part of the entrenchments not on fire. But owing to the efforts of Hancock, their success was but temporary. Carroll, of Gibbon’s division, moved at a double quick with his brigade and drove back the enemy, inflicting great loss. Fighting had continued from five in the morning sometimes along the whole line, at other times only in places. The ground fought over had varied in width, but averaged three-quarters of a mile. The killed, and many of the severely wounded, of both armies, lay within this belt where it was impossible to reach them. The woods were set on fire by the bursting shells, and the conflagration raged. The wounded who had not the strength to move themselves were either suffocated or burned to death. Finally the fire communicated with our breastworks, in places. Being constructed of wood, they burned with great fury. But the battle still raged, our men firing through the flames until it became too hot to remain longer.
Lee was now in distress. His men were in confusion, and his personal efforts failed to restore order. These facts, however, were learned subsequently, or we would have taken advantage of his condition and no doubt gained a decisive success. His troops were withdrawn now, but I revoked the order, which I had given previously to this assault, for Hancock to attack, because his troops had exhausted their ammunition and did not have time to replenish from the train, which was at some distance.
During the night all of Lee’s army withdrew within their entranchments…. Pickets and skirmishers were sent along our entire front to find the position of the enemy. Some went as far as a mile and a half before finding him. But Lee showed no disposition to come out of his works. There was no battle during the day, and but little firing…. This ended the Battle of the Wilderness.
More desperate fighting has not been witnessed on this continent than on the fifth and sixth of May. Our victory consisted in having successfully crossed a formidable stream, almost in the face of an enemy, and in getting the army together as a unit. We gained an advantage on the morning of the sixth, which, if it had been followed up, must have proven very decisive. In the evening the enemy gained an advantage; but was speedily repulsed. As we stood at the close, the two armies were relatively in the same condition to meet with each other as when the river divided them. But the fact of having safely crossed was a victory….”
The Confederate War: How Popular Will, Nationalism, and Military Strategy Could Not Stave Off Defeat Gary Gallagher P. 138-139
(1863)
“Lee’s victories at Fredericksburg and Chancellorsville sent another series of shock waves through the North. “My God! my God!” agonized Lincoln after Chancellorsville” “What will the country say?” Senator Charles Sumner of Massachusetts answered for many northerners when he blurted out to Secretary of the Navy Gideon Welles, “Lost, lost, all is lost.” One careful historian observed that the “Union army had again suffered a bitter blow to its morale, and the North was once more sunk in discouragement”– a situation arising from Lee’s apparent mastery of the generals who commanded the Army of the Potomac.”
Ken Burns’s the Civil War: Historians Respond Robert Brent Toplin P. 57-58 “How Familiarity Bred Success: Military Campaigns and Leaders in Ken Burns’s The Civil War.” Gary W. Gallagher
“The correlation between events on the battlefield and morale behind the lines also remains underdeveloped. Lee’s stunning triumphs in 1862-1863 convinced many white southerners (as well as a number of soldiers in the Army of the Potomac) that he could not be beaten. For the rest of the war, an expectation of success from the Army of Northern Virginian helped maintain Confederate morale as southern arms suffered setbacks almost everywhere else. The Army of the Potomac’s string of losses more than once spread turmoil through northern society. Defeats at the Seven Days and Second Bull Run triggered a diplomatic crisis, another pair of setbacks at Fredericksburg and Chancellorsville fueled support for the antiwar Copperheads, and Grant’s inability to deliver a knockout blow to Lee’s army during May and June 1864 helped drive northern morale to its lowest point of the conflict. Specific development of these connections between the battlefield and the home front would have formed a useful theme in Burns’s documentary, while also deflecting complaints that he gave too much attention to the military.”
Note: *Ken Burns’ film “The Civil War”: 13.9 million Americans (more than the population of the Confederacy) watched the first broadcast. More than 50 million and climbing have seen the series, which contained 16,000 photographs (many of them swathed together and making no narrative sense) & over 900 quotes in the 11 hours; Ken Burns gauzy film lens camera & you got that music stuck in your head a week but somehow you got little usable narrative out of it but too bad about all those dead.
Note: 7 miles west of Staunton today Jackson’s and Johnston’s forces join. Battle of McDowell (150 miles southwest of Kernstown). Jackson defeats Robert Milroy in the Shenandoah Valley.
Note: Grant on this day in 1864: “Oh, I am heartily tired of hearing about what Lee is going to do. Some of you always seem to think he is suddenly going to turn a double somersault, and land in our rear and on both of our flanks at the same time. Go back to your command, and try to think what we are going to do ourselves, instead of what Lee is going to do.”
*On Charleston being next, see June 4.
Note: 7 miles west of Staunton today Jackson’s and Johnston’s forces join. Battle of McDowell (150 miles southwest of Kernstown). Jackson defeats Robert Milroy in the Shenandoah Valley.
Note: Today Jefferson Davis is baptized into the Episcopal Church today, joins St. Paul’s in Richmond.
Note: In 2000, South Carolina’s Statehouse was still flying the Confederate flag. 46,000 protested. After the 2015 Emanuel AME Church shooting, it was not lowered to half-staff like the State flag and the American flag. To chants of “Take it down,” July, 2015, it was finally lowered & given to the “Confederate Relic Room and Military Museum.”
Note: Sign in Charlottesville: Real AMERICAN Patriots Do Not Wave The Nazi Or Confederate Flags We Had Two Wars About This You’re 0-2
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expecting to draw Jackson back so we may have a fight….
Mistakes. McClellan was making mistakes. He was what he really was: a shark flipped on its back in tonic immobility, as if some mechanism has gotten stuck somehow & it is low tide at the seas of the world. He’s a backward movement in an orbit. He’s on his own script now in a sort of dream logic, looking for nothing else but the first place he can tie his justification off to. But he’s been made.
Lincoln tries to give him a pop on the snout, sends receipts & the chopper. You deadass? This will not stand, man. One more note asking for troops ima end my shit SKSKSK. MC leaves L on read eating crow while he googles how to pin a tail on a general. Fumish. It looks like a pantomime. Poor Abe’s starting to feel like he needs his own bat signal.
But Lee? He knows him down to the ground. Knows McClellan just wants to hit up Waffle House for some of them Texas biscuits, gravy, maybe a mint julep.
Jackson leaves for east of the Blue Ridges; meantime Lincoln’s asking what’s your 20? but McClellan’s gone up to bed since the Ref could take a point away because there’s no home games. A true arc in character, peak McClellan.
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