The great battle of Fredericksburg.
The battle of Saturday, taking into consideration the number of men engaged the quantity of artillery and other engines of war employed, the valor of the combatants, and the skill of the
Generals, was probably the greatest battle ever fought, on this Continent.
It was fought by nearly 200,000 men and several hundred pieces of artillery.
It was contested for ten hours. It resulted in a complete victory to the Confederate forces.
We say complete, because although the enemy's force was not annihilated — killed, captured, or dispersed — the failure was entirely owing to the near-neighborhood of their strongholds, to which they fled when they found themselves unable to face our forces any longer in the field.
Had the battle been fought twenty miles this side of the
Rappahannock river there would have been such a rout as the world did not witness in the forty six years that elapsed between the battle of Waterico and the
first battle of Manassas.
As it was, it has proved to the
Yankees that no superiority of numbers or of preparation can avail them in a pitched battle with the forces of the
Confederacy — a truth so latest, and so often exemplified, that we believe they are the only people on earth who venture to deny it.
Our loss has been heavy, but bears no comparison whatever to that of the enemy.
We have to regret about 2,500 killed, wounded and missing; while, according to the report of those best skilled in making estimates of this description,
their loss does not certainly fall short of 10,000, and in all probability greatly exceeds it. This will not be regarded as at all improbable when we take into consideration the relative position of the opposing armies.
The Confederates were on the heights, which rendered them less accessible to cannon.
The
Yankees were in the low grounds, subjected to a murderous fire of artillery and musketry at they advanced.
Every shot told and those who witnessed it say that the slaughter was awful beyond anything yet witnessed in the war.
General Longstreet succeeded in getting possession of a long stone wall, on the outskirts of
Fredericksburg, and in placing a whole division be hind it. The
Yankees, with more boldness than they usually exhibit on such occasions attempted to get possession of it. They were repulsed with unparalleled slaughter in every attempt, and at last broke and fled in confusion.
The
Yankees, we presume will wait for the arrival of
Sigel's corps, before they try their luck again.
What may be the strength of this body we have no means of determining.
But we feel convinced that it is not sufficiently great to after the result, and that if, after its arrival, another attack shall be hazarded, the end will be the same.
The general hope here is that the trial will be made to confident are all in the valor of our army and the consummate skill of its great leader.
It seems to be doubted whether
Gen. Lee permitted the enemy to come over, or whether he could have prevented it had he tried.
It seems to us that he bad every reason to wish them to come over.
He had selected his field of battle, and had thoroughly studied it, as
Napoleon had done the field of
Austerlitz when he fell back thirty miles to draw his enemy to it, and as
Wellington is said to have done at
Waterloo.--He had an army full of confidences in themselves and in him. The disparity of force was not so great as to render victory at all improbable when the composition of the two armies and the animating spirit of each are taken into consideration.
If they were determined to pass, he could hardly have prevented them, since they had possession of the heights on the Stafford side, and had crowned them with innumerable batteries.
What may have been his motives, it is impossible for us, of course, to say; but we understand one of his officers, very high in rank, expressed himself in strong terms anxious above all things for them to come over, and try their fortune on the very ground which was the theatre of the battle, several weeks age.
This is the tenth pitched battle in which
General Lee has commanded, within less than six months, and in all of them he has been victorious.
No other campaign except that of
Italy in 1796, and that of
France in 1814, presents such a result.
Our people are cheered by the reflection that their armies are commanded by two
Generals who have no rival in the art of war —
Lee on the
Rappahannock, and
Johnston in the
Southwest.
They are as superior to the
Yankee Generals in every quality that constitutes the
military chief as the soldiers they lead are to the thieves and cutthroats that
Lincoln has sent to subjugate them.
