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Jackson turned off from the plank road at
Aldrich's, not far from
Chancellorsville, and moved swiftly and stealthily through the thick woods, with
Stuart's cavalry between him and the
Union lines, to the
Orange plank road, four miles westward of
Chancellorsville.
At the same time
Lee was attracting the attention of
Hooker by vigorous demonstrations on his front, as if he was about to attack in full force.
The march of
Jackson was not perfectly concealed.
So early as eight o'clock in the morning,
General Birney, who was in command of
Sickles's (First) division, between the
Catharine Furnace and
Melzie Chancellor's (
Dowdall's tavern), discovered a portion of
Jackson's column, under
Rodes, crossing Lewis's Creek, and moving rapidly southward.
When informed of this,
Sickles made a personal reconnoissance, and dispatched a courier to
Hooker with the intelligence.
The general impression among the commanders was, that
Lee's army was retreating toward
Richmond, and
Hooker directed
Sickles to ascertain the real character of the movement.
For that purpose the latter pushed forward
Birney's division, followed by
Whipple's and
Barlow's brigades of
Howard's corps.
Cannon were opened on the passing column, which threw it into some confusion, and expelled it from the highway; but
it pressed steadily along the wood paths and a new road opened by it. Then
Sickles directed
Birney to charge upon it. He did so, and cut off and captured a Georgia (Twenty-third) regiment, five hundred strong, when
Birney's farther advance was checked by
Colonel Brown's artillery and a brigade under
Anderson.
The National troops now held the road over which
Jackson had been marching, and preparations were made for a vigorous pursuit of the supposed fugitives.
Sickles asked for re-enforcements, when
Pleasanton was sent with his cavalry, and
Howard and
Slocum each forwarded a brigade to help him. But before these forces could be brought to bear upon
Jackson, near the
Furnace, he had crossed the
Orange plank road, and under cover of the dense jungle of the
Wilderness, had pushed swiftly northward to the old turnpike and beyond, feeling his enemy at every step.
Then he turned his face toward
Chancellorsville, and, just before six o'clock in the evening,
he burst from the thickets with twenty-five thousand men, and like a sudden, unexpected, and terrible tornado, swept on toward the flank and rear of
Howard's corps, which occupied the
National right, the game of the forest — deers, wild turkeys, and hares — flying wildly before him, and becoming to the startled
Unionists the heralds of the approaching
