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Capt. Harlock -> RE: Civil War 150th (10/19/2014 3:44:35 PM)
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150 Years Ago Today:
Possibly inspired by John Brown's raid on Harper's Ferry, a group of twenty-one Confederates had assembled in Canada for a strike at the town of St. Albans in Vermont. On this date, having come over the border in small groups, they gathered in the main square of the town shortly after noon, threw off their overcoats to reveal Confederate uniforms, and announced to the townspeople that they had taken over the town in the name of the Confederacy.
Many of the locals simply didn't believe them at first, but when the Southerners started robbing the three main banks, matters were taken seriously. Some of the townsmen grabbed their weapons and started shooting, but the Rebels gave better than they got, killing one man and wounding a second. (The northernmost land fatality of the Civil War.) After over $200,000 had been taken, the Confederates tried to set fire to a number of buildings with the hope of engulfing the entire town. This part did not work, however; the "Greek fire" they had brought was a failure and the buildings were still wet from a rain the day before.
The raiders mounted their horses and managed to escape the posse assembled to catch them. By nightfall they were back over the border into Canada. There, a number of them would be arrested, but eventually released because they had been wearing uniforms and so were considered soldiers instead of bandits. (The Canadians did return about $80,000 of the bank money.)
Near Cedar Creek in the Shenandoah Valley, Jubal Early's plan went into motion:
At one o'clock on the morning of the 19th, Kershaw and Wharton moved, and I accompanied them. At Strasburg Kershaw moved to the right on the road to Bowman's Mill, and Wharton moved along the Pike to Hupp's Hill, with instructions not to display his forces but avoid the enemy's notice until the attack began, when he was to move forward, support the artillery when it came up, and send a force to get possession of the bridge on the Pike over the creek. I accompanied Kershaw's division, and we got in sight of the enemy's fires at halfpast three o'clock. The moon was now shining and we could see the camps. The division was halted under cover to await the arrival of the proper time, and I pointed out to Kershaw, and the commander of his leading brigade, the enemy's position and described the nature of the ground, and directed them how the attack was to be made and followed up. Kershaw was directed to cross his division over the creek as quietly as possible, and to form it into column of brigades, as he did so, and advance in that manner against the enemy's left breastwork, extending to the right or left as might be necessary.
At half-past four he was ordered forward, and, a very short time after he started, the firing from Rosser, on our left, and the picket firing at the ford at which Gordon was crossing were heard. Kershaw crossed the creek without molestation and formed his division as directed, and precisely at five o'clock his leading brigade, with little opposition, swept over the enemy's left work, capturing seven guns, which were at once turned on the enemy. As soon as this attack was made, I rode as rapidly as possible to the position on Hupp's Hill to which Wharton and the artillery had been ordered. I found the artillery just arriving, and a very heavy fire of musketry was now heard in the enemy's rear from Gordon's column. Wharton had advanced his skirmishers to the creek, capturing some prisoners, but the enemy still held the works on our left of the Pike, commanding that road and the bridge, and opened with his artillery on us. Our artillery was immediately brought into action and opened on the enemy, but he soon evacuated his works, and our men from the other columns rushed into them.
Just then the sun rose, and Wharton's division, and the artillery were ordered immediately forward. I rode in advance of them across the creek, and met General Gordon on the opposite hill. Kershaw's division had swept along the enemy's works on the right of the Pike, which were occupied by Crook's corps, and he and Gordon had united at the Pike, and their divisions had pushed across it in pursuit of the enemy. . .
--Jubal Early, Autobiographical Sketch and Narrative of the War Between the States
[image]local://upfiles/4250/5F68D6B7882E4B13BF3C775E4EB42061.gif[/image]
Thus far the attack had been a brilliant success. The surprised Union soldiers abandoned their positions, and in running for the rear, spread panic. The whooping Rebels rolled up their foes by regiments, then brigades, then divisions. Shortly only one Northern corps out of three was still standing. And it appeared that Early had partly redeemed the number of cannon he had lost to the Yankees during previous battles, for eighteen guns were taken. But then what Early had feared began to happen. It was too much to ask that hungry, poorly clothed soldiers who had marched nearly the whole night could resist the temptation of the helping themselves to the food, clothing, and other useful things to be found in the hastily abandoned Union camps:
As I passed across Cedar Creek after the enemy was driven from it, I had discovered a number of men in the enemy's camps plundering, and one of Wharton's battalions was ordered to clear the camps, and drive the men to their commands.
It was reported to me, subsequently, that a great number were at the same work, and I sent all my staff officers who could be spared, to stop it if possible, and orders were sent to the division commanders to send for their men.
--Jubal Early, Autobiographical Sketch and Narrative of the War Between the States
In the meantime, Philip Sheridan had the first inklings of the Union debacle. Even in the days before radio, news could spread surprisingly quickly:
Toward 6 o'clock the morning of the 19th, the officer on picket duty at Winchester came to my room, I being yet in bed, and reported artillery firing from the direction of Cedar Creek. I asked him if the firing was continuous or only desultory, to which he replied that it was not a sustained fire, but rather irregular and fitful. I remarked: "It's all right; Grover has gone out this morning to make a reconnoissance, and he is merely feeling the enemy." I tried to go to sleep again, but grew so restless that I could not, and soon got up and dressed myself.
[...]
We mounted our horses between half-past 8 and 9, and as we were proceeding up the street which leads directly through Winchester . . . I noticed that there were many women at the windows and doors of the houses, who kept shaking their skirts at us and who were otherwise markedly insolent in their demeanor, but supposing this conduct to be instigated by their well-known and perhaps natural prejudices, I ascribed to it no unusual significance. On reaching the edge of the town I halted a moment, and there heard quite distinctly the sound of artillery firing in an unceasing roar. Concluding from this that a battle was in progress, I now felt confident that the women along the street had received intelligence from the battle, field by the "grape-vine telegraph," and were in raptures over some good news...
--Personal Memoirs of P. H. Sheridan, General, United States Army
A short distance out of town, Sheridan discovered how good the news was for the pro-Southerners:
...just as we made the crest of the rise beyond the stream, there burst upon our view the appalling spectacle of a panic-stricken army--hundreds of slightly wounded men, throngs of others unhurt but utterly demoralized, and baggage-wagons by the score, all pressing to the rear in hopeless confusion, telling only too plainly that a disaster had occurred at the front. On accosting some of the fugitives, they assured me that the army was broken up, in full retreat, and that all was lost; all this with a manner true to that peculiar indifference that takes possession of panic-stricken men. I was greatly disturbed by the sight, but at once sent word to Colonel Edwards commanding the brigade in Winchester, to stretch his troops across the valley, near Mill Creek, and stop all fugitives, directing also that the transportation be passed through and parked on the north side of the town. As I continued at a walk a few hundred yards farther, thinking all the time of Longstreet's telegram to Early, "Be ready when I join you, and we will crush Sheridan," I was fixing in my mind what I should do. My first thought was to stop the army in the suburbs of Winchester as it came back, form a new line, and fight there; but as the situation was more maturely considered a better conception prevailed.
--Personal Memoirs of P. H. Sheridan, General, United States Army
At Cedar Creek, there was still on corps of Union infantry in good order, plus a number of Union cavalry. These formed a defensive line to rear of the original Union position. Jubal Early and his subordinates wanted to make their victory complete, but they no longer had surprise on their side.
I found Ramseur and Kershaw in line with Pegram, but Gordon had not come up. In a short time, however, I found him coming up from the rear, and I ordered him to take position on Kershaw's left, and advance for the purpose of driving the enemy from his new position--Kershaw and Ramseur being ordered to advance at the same time. As the enemy's cavalry on our left was very strong, and had the benefit of an open country to the rear of that flank, a repulse at this time would have been disastrous, and I therefore directed General Gordon, if he found the enemy's line too strong to attack with success, not to make the assault. The advance was made for some distance, when Gordon's skirmishers came back, reporting a line of battle in front behind breastworks, and Gordon did not make the attack.
It was now apparent that it would not do to press my troops further. They had been up all night and were much jaded. In passing over rough ground to attack the enemy in the early morning, their own ranks had been much disordered, and the men scattered, and it had required time to re-form them. Their ranks, moreover, were much thinned by the advance of the men engaged in plundering the enemy's camps. The delay which had unavoidably occurred had enabled the enemy to rally a portion of his routed troops, and his immense force of cavalry, which remained intact, was threatening both of our flanks in an open country, which of itself rendered an advance extremely hazardous.
I determined, therefore, to try and hold what had been gained, and orders were given for carrying off the captured and abandoned artillery, small arms and wagons.
--Jubal Early, Autobiographical Sketch and Narrative of the War Between the States
The word spread that Sheridan had returned. To borrow Grant's words, "His presence soon restored confidence. Finding themselves worse frightened than hurt the men did halt and turn back. " Some had retreated as far as 10 miles (16 km), but went to the scene of action again. Sheridan arrived at the front before noon, but waited until enough of his troops had both returned and been deployed in an organized fashion to give him the clear advantage.
Between half-past and 4 o'clock, I was ready to assail, and decided to do so by advancing my infantry line in a swinging movement, so as to gain the Valley pike with my right between Middletown and the Belle Grove House; and when the order was passed along, the men pushed steadily forward with enthusiasm and confidence.
--Personal Memoirs of P. H. Sheridan, General, United States Army
Although the Confederates had been holding their ground for several hours, they had not bothered to dig in. Both sides had reason to be tired; the Rebels had marched most of the night before their pre-dawn assault, while many of the Yankees had run for miles in the morning, and then had to march nearly the same distance in the early afternoon back to the front lines. But there was a difference between men who had been on scanty rations for months, and those who had been well-fed.
Late in the afternoon, the enemy's infantry advanced against Ramseur's, Kershaw's and Gordon's lines, and the attack on Ramseur's and Kershaw's fronts was handsomely repulsed in my view, and I hoped that the day was finally ours, but a portion of the enemy had penetrated an interval which was between Evans' brigade, on the extreme left, and the rest of the line, when that brigade gave way, and Gordon's other brigades soon followed. General Gordon made every possible effort to rally his men, and lead them back against the enemy, but without avail. The information of this affair, with exaggerations, passed rapidly along Kershaw's and Ramseur's lines, and their men, under the apprehension of being flanked, commenced falling back in disorder, though no enemy was pressing them, and this gave me the first intimation of Gordon's condition.
At the same time the enemy's cavalry, observing the disorder in our ranks, made another charge on our right, but was repulsed. Every effort was made to stop and rally Kershaw's and Ramseur's men, but the mass of them resisted all appeals, and continued to go to the rear without waiting for any effort to retrieve the partial disorder.
--Jubal Early, Autobiographical Sketch and Narrative of the War Between the States
[image]local://upfiles/4250/84C7E89557E64ECAA821AE21B5BC3E84.jpg[/image]
The disorder rapidly went from "partial" to "total", and the Southerners' retreat deteriorated into an all-out debacle. Many of the equipment wagons were left behind, as were all of the eighteen Union guns captured in the morning, and twenty-three Confederate guns besides.
All our troops were now moving on the retreating Confederates, and as I rode to the front Colonel Gibbs, who succeeded Lowell, made ready for another mounted charge, but I checked him from pressing the enemy's right, in the hope that the swinging attack from my right would throw most of the Confederates to the east of the Valley pike, and hence off their line of retreat through Strasburg to Fisher's Hill. The eagerness of the men soon frustrated this anticipation, however, the left insisting on keeping pace with the centre and right, and all pushing ahead till we regained our old camps at Cedar Creek. Beyond Cedar Creek, at Strasburg, the pike makes a sharp turn to the west toward Fisher's Hill, and here Merritt uniting with Custer, they together fell on the flank of the retreating columns, taking many prisoners, wagons, and guns, among the prisoners being Major-General Ramseur, who, mortally wounded, died the next day.
--Personal Memoirs of P. H. Sheridan, General, United States Army
Total losses for the North were 569 killed, 3,425 wounded, and 1,770 missing or captured, and for the South 320 killed, 1,540 wounded, and 1,050 missing or captured. In terms of casualties, the Union had actually had the worst of the battle. But the Confederate army had been scattered, and lost many guns and other equipment. Early would mange to pull his force back together in time, but without enough cavalry or artillery, it would never again be a threat to the Northern army. The Shenandoah Valley was, for practical purposes, lost to the Confederacy. And the dramatic tale of Sheridan's ride, "snatching victory from the jaws of defeat", was an immense boost for the Republicans. Lincoln's re-election, which had seemed a lost cause only two months before, was now a virtual certainty.
Maps by Hal Jespersen, www.cwmaps.com
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