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The Annals of the Civil War Written by Leading Participants North and South (ed. Alexander Kelly McClure), Stonewall Jackson's Valley campaign. (search)
8th of February Roanoke Island fell, on the 16th Fort Donelson, on the 26th Nashville, and on the 27th the evacuation of Columbus (Kentucky) was begun. These successes made the Federal administration impatient to push forward operations in Virginia. At the urgent representation of General McClellan, President Lincoln had yielded his favorite plan of campaign — an advance against the Confederate lines at Manassas-and had reluctantly consented to the transfer of the Army of the Potomac to Fort Monroe, and its advance thence on Richmond. Before he would allow McClellan, however, to begin the transfer, the Potomac river, below Washington, must be cleared of Confederate batteries, the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad must be recovered and protected, and all the approaches to Washington must be made secure. To fulfil a part of these conditions, Banks' and Lander's commands were ordered forward, and on February 24th General Banks occupied Harper's Ferry. Soon after McClellan began the moveme
Robert Lewis Dabney, Life and Commands of Lieutenand- General Thomas J. Jackson, Chapter 5: secession. (search)
was, in fact, slavish co-operation with their enemies; the one, on the plea that the military highway to the tyrants' capital lay through her heart; and the other, on the ground that one-third of her border was only separated by a great river from the assailants! The defection of Kentucky left Virginia exposed on three sides to her invaders, and one of these the sea, vexed with the countless keels of the enemy; while his mercenaries had stolen, and now held her greatest place of arms, Fortress Monroe, which commanded the approach to the wharves of her chief sea-port and her capital city. Her border lay under the muzzles of the cannon which frowned from the ramparts of Washington, and it was plain. to friend and foe, thai her smiling fields must be the chief arena for trampling armies. But these men did not quail on account of this; having taken counsel only of God and the right, Virginia stepped into the imminent deadly breach, baring her own fair bosom to the fiercest strokes o
Robert Lewis Dabney, Life and Commands of Lieutenand- General Thomas J. Jackson, Chapter 9: General view of the campaigns of 1862. (search)
? The opening of the campaign of 1862 found the Federalists firmly seated upon the coast of South Carolina at Beaufort, and of North Carolina at Fort Macon, Newberne, and Roanoke Island. On the eastern borders of Virginia, they occupied Fortress Monroe, and Newport News, all the lower peninsula between the James and York Rivers, and the mouth of the Rappahannock. Near the ancient towns of Williamsburg and York, General Magruder, with a few thousand men, held their superior numbers at bay:nd Banks, to insulate and overpower the right wing resting on the Potomac at Evansport, and to surround and crush General Johnston at Manassas, or else to force him toward Richmond, and pursue him. The army on the Peninsula, setting out from Fortress Monroe, was to press back General Magruder, and assail the capital from the East. The forces in the Valley, having beaten General Jackson, were either to converge towards the rear of Manassa's Junction, by crossing the Blue Ridge, or else to march
Robert Lewis Dabney, Life and Commands of Lieutenand- General Thomas J. Jackson, Chapter 11: McDowell. (search)
Chapter 11: McDowell. From April 1st to April 17th, General Jackson occupied the position already described, upon Reede's Hill. Meantime, the grand armies of the Potomac had wholly changed their theatre of war. April 1st, General McClellan appeared at Fortress Monroe, on the eastern extremity of the peninsula between the James and York Rivers, and began to direct the approaches of his mighty host against Richmond from that point. On the 4th, he appeared before the lines of General Magruder, at Young's Mill, while at the same date, the troops of General Johnston were pouring through Richmond, from their lines behind the Rappahannock, to reinforce their brethren defending the peninsula. General Jackson's prospect of a junction with the main army in Culpepper were, therefore, at an end; and his movements were thus rendered, for a time, more independent of the other Confederate forces. The correctness of his reasonings upon the probable movements of the Federalists was now verifi
Robert Lewis Dabney, Life and Commands of Lieutenand- General Thomas J. Jackson, Chapter 14: the Richmond campaign. (search)
but the habitual exaggerations of his apprehensive temper were patent, even to his own Government. He states that his own force was reduced to eighty thousand effective men. It must be remembered that during the campaign before Richmond, the motives of McClellan's policy dictated a studied depreciation of his own numbers. In the returns given by himself in another place, his effective force present for duty is set down at one hundred and six thousand men, inclusive of the garrison of Fortress Monroe under General Dix. Halleck declared, in his letter of Aug. 6th, that McClellan still had ninety thousand men at Berkeley, after all his losses I These McClellan had estimated at fifteen thousand, how truthfully may be known from this: that he places the men lost by desertion and capture under six thousand, whereas the Confederates had in their hands more than ten thousand prisoners; and the woods of the peninsula were swarming with stragglers. Whatever may have beer his numerical supe
Thomas C. DeLeon, Four years in Rebel capitals: an inside view of life in the southern confederacy, from birth to death., Chapter 12: settling to the real work. (search)
rmed by the James and York rivers, Norfolk, and the open country around and about Orange Courthouse to the Potomac. Fortress Monroe impregnable to assault, by the land side, and so easily provisioned and garrisoned by sea, was looked upon as the mon him; and Norfolk was soon declared securely fortified. The Peninsula was even more exposed to land attack from Fortress Monroe; and General John B. Magruder had been sent there with a part of the Virginia army, with headquarters at Yorktown. m, and re-enforcements --sufficient in its judgment, though not in his — were sent at once to his command. While Fortress Monroe threatened the safety of Norfolk, and, by the Peninsula of the lower approaches to Richmond, Alexandria could hold aConfederate Government was actually crossing the Rubicon and carrying the war directly into the southern territory. Fortress Monroe and other fortified points still held by the United States, in the South, were conceded to be in a measure hers, at
Thomas C. DeLeon, Four years in Rebel capitals: an inside view of life in the southern confederacy, from birth to death., Chapter 16: the Spawn of lethargy. (search)
en contracted — more from choice than necessity. But the combatants were near enough-and respected each other enough --for constant watchfulness to be considered necessary; and, though the personnel of the army was, perhaps, not as good as that of the Potomac, in the main its condition was better. At Norfolk nothing had been done but to strengthen the defenses. General Huger had striven to keep his men employed; and they, at least, did not despise the enemy that frowned at them from Fort Monroe, and frequently sent messages of compliment into their camps from the lips of the Sawyer gun. The echo of the paeans from Manassas came back to them, but softened by distance and tempered by their own experience-or want of it. In Western Virginia there had been a dull, eventless campaign, of strategy rather than action. General Wise had taken command on the first of June, and early in August had been followed by General John B. Floyd--the ex-U. S. Secretary of War. These two co
Thomas C. DeLeon, Four years in Rebel capitals: an inside view of life in the southern confederacy, from birth to death., Chapter 30: the Confederacy afloat. (search)
s, transports and supply ships ran defiantly up and down; laughing at the futile efforts of the point batteries to annoy them, and indulging in a dream of security that was to be most rudely broken. The Susquehanna frigate, with heaviest armament in the Federal navy, laid in the channel at Newport News, blockading the mouth of James river and cutting off communication from Norfolk. The Congress frigate was lying near her, off the News; while the Minnesota lay below, under the guns of Fortress Monroe. The Ericsson Monitor — the first of her class, and equally an experiment as her rebel rival-had come round a few days before to watch the Virginia, as the new iron-clad was now rechristened. The great ship being ready, Flag-Officer Buchanan ordered the Jamestown, Captain Barney, and the Yorktown, Captain Tucker, down from Richmond; while he went out with the Raleigh and Beaufort --two of the smallest class of gunboats, saved by Captain Lynch from Roanoke Island. This combined for
Thomas C. DeLeon, Four years in Rebel capitals: an inside view of life in the southern confederacy, from birth to death., Chapter 37: dies irae-dies illa. (search)
Chapter 37: dies irae-dies illa. The lull at Petersburg strain on army and people North and South waiting fears for Richmond after Atlanta peace propositions Mr. Davis' attitude Mr. Stephens' failure at Fortress Monroe Hood's fatal move results of Franklin strange gayeties in Richmond from the Dance to the grave Starvations and theatricals evacuation rumors only Richmond left Joe Johnston Reinstated near desperation Grant Strikes the news in church evacuation scenes way. Even the Congress seemed impressed with the necessity of meeting any overtures from the North, before it was too late and our dire strait should be known there. But it was already too late; and the resultless mission of Mr. Stephens to Fortress Monroe proved that the Washington Government now saw plainly that it could force upon us the terms it made the show of offering. The failure of this mission, no less than the great mystery in which the Government endeavored to wrap it, produced
Jubal Anderson Early, Ruth Hairston Early, Lieutenant General Jubal A. Early , C. S. A., Autobiographical sketch. (search)
ut in August, 1837, a number of my class, myself included, were ordered to Fortress Monroe to drill a considerable body of recruits which were in rendezvous at that being sent to Florida, where the Seminole War was still in progress. From Fortress Monroe, with several other officers, I accompanied a body of recruits which saile were the other field officers. The regiment was ordered to rendezvous at Fortress Monroe and the superintendence of the drilling there and the embarkation for Mexi on account of some delay in the organization of them, I did not sail from Fortress Monroe with the last detachment of these companies until March 1st, arriving at Bregiment to the mouth of the Rio Grande, and had it embarked at Brazos for Fortress Monroe, going on one of the vessels myself. I was mustered out of the service wibut I can safely say that, on the day they were mustered out of service at Fortress Monroe, I was the most popular officer in the regiment, and I had the satisfactio
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