William Swinton, Campaigns of the Army of the Potomac

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[375] the whole day, so that it was evening before he penetrated to the Confederate line of battle at Front Royal. Next morning, when Meade hoped to give battle, Lee had made good his retreat.¹ Upon this, as nothing was now to be hoped from the movement on hand, the march was conducted leisurely towards the Rappahannock, and Lee retired to the vicinity of Culpepper.

In this position a considerable period of repose followed; and this inaction was imposed not more by the necessity of resting and recruiting the army, than because both sides found it necessary to draw detachments from the armies in Virginia for other needs. From the army of Meade a considerable body was taken to send to South Carolina, and a large force withdrawn to dispatch to New York for the purpose of enforcing the draft, the attempted execution of which, some time before, had given rise to extensive riots in that city. On the other hand, the severe pressure that Rosecrans was bringing to bear upon the central army of the Confederacy under General Bragg, in Tennessee, prompted the detachment from Lee's army of the corps of Longstreet, for the purpose of throwing it into the scale as a make-weight against the Union force. This withdrawal took place early in September, and necessarily reduced the Confederates to a purely defensive attitude in Virginia. Soon afterwards, General Meade became aware of Longstreet's departure, and he then sent his cavalry across the Rappahannock, drove the enemy over the Rapidan, and subsequently followed with his whole force, occupying Culpepper and the regions between the Rappahannock and the Rapidan, the latter river now becoming the