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| Daniel Tyler. |
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[585]
by Brigadier-Generals Daniel Tyler and Theodore Runyon, and Colonels David Hunter, Samuel P. Heintzelman, and Dixon S. Miles.
The Confederate force against which this army was to move was distributed along Bull's Run,1 from Union Mill, where the Orange and Alexandria Railway crosses that stream, to the Stone Bridge of the Warrenton Turnpike, the interval being about eight miles.2 The run formed an admirable line of defense.
Its steep, rocky, and wooded banks, and its deep bed, formed an almost impassable barrier to troops, excepting at the fords, which were a mile or two apart.
They had reserves at Camp Pickens, near Manassas Junction, a dreary hamlet before the war, on a high, bleak plain, and composed of an indifferent railway station-house and place of refreshments and a few scattered cottages.
Near there,
at Weir's house, at the junction of the Centreville and Union Mill roads, Beauregard had his Headquarters.
The Confederates had an outpost, with fortifications, at Centreville, and strong pickets and slight fortifications at Fairfax Court House, a village, ten miles from the main army, in the direction of Washington City. General Johnston, as we have observed, was strongly intrenched at Winchester, in the Shenandoah
1 This is an inconsiderable stream, which rises in the range of hills known as Bull's Run Mountains. See map on page 586. It empties into the Occoquan River about twelve miles from the Potomac.
2 The disposition of the Confederate forces was as follows:--
Ewell's brigade occupied a position near the Union Mill Ford, and was composed of the Fifth and Seventh Alabama, and Fifth Louisiana Volunteers, with four 12-pound howitzers of Walton's battery of the Washington Artillery of New Orleans, and three companies of Virginia cavalry. D. R. Jones's brigade was in the rear of McLean's Ford, and was composed of the Fifth South Carolina and the Fifteenth and Eighteenth Mississippi Volunteers, with two brass 6-pounders of Walton's battery, and one company of cavalry. The brigade of James Longstreet covered Blackburn's Ford. It was composed of the First, Eleventh, and Seventeenth Virginia Volunteers, with two brass 6-pounders of Walton's battery. M. L. Bonham's brigade, stationed at Centreville, covered the approaches to Mitchell's Ford. It consisted of the Second, Third, Seventh, and Eighth South Carolina Volunteers, two light batteries, and four companies of Virginia cavalry under Colonel Radford. Cocke's brigade held a position below the Stone Bridge and vicinity, and consisted of the Eighteenth, Nineteenth, and Twenty-eighth Virginia Volunteers, a company of cavalry, and a light battery. Colonel Evans, with the Fourth South Carolina, a special Louisiana battalion under Colonel Wheat, four 6-pounders, and a company of Virginia cavalry, guarded the Stone Bridge; and Early's brigade, composed of the Seventh and Twenty-fourth Virginia, and Seventh Louisiana Volunteers, with three rifled cannon of Walton's battery, held a position in the rear of Ewell's brigade.--Beauregard's Report to Adjutant-General Cooper.
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