Longstreet says, in writing on June 7th:Believing that Whiting had, on the right, as much as he could well attend to, I went with Hatton's Brigade to the extreme front line of Hampton and Pettigrew in the woods, and soon learned that General Pettigrew had been wounded, it was supposed mortally, and was a prisoner. General Hatton was killed at my side just as his brigade reached the front line of battle, and in a very few minutes General Hampton was severely wounded. In this state of affairs, I sent word to General Whiting that I would take executive control in that wood, which would relieve him for the time of care for the left of the division, and enable him to give his undivided attention to the right.
In the wood, the opposing lines were close to each other, in some places not more than twenty-five or thirty yards apart. The firing ceased at dark, when I ordered the line to fall back to the edge of the field and re-form. In the meantime Whiting's Brigade and the right of Pettigrew's had been forced back to the clump of trees just north of Fair Oaks station, where the contest was kept up until night.Battles and Leaders of the Civil War, Vol. II, p. 247.
The failure of complete success on Saturday, I attribute to the slow movements of General Huger's command. * * * I can't but help think that a display of his forces on the left flank of the enemy would have completed the affair, and given Whiting as easy and pretty a game as was ever had upon a battle-field.In the cold, calm light of facts now developed, it is not difficult to see that the slowness was on the part of the writer of that report, who should, by Johnston's orders, have moved at daybreak on the 31st, and who failed to move at all, as ordered by General Smith, on the morning of June 1st. Although not permitted to gather the fruits of their unyielding courage, Smith's Division, under Whiting, prevented Sumner's
