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Opportunity to the South: Meade versus Jackson at Fredericksburg

1987; Kent State University Press; Volume: 33; Issue: 4 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1353/cwh.1987.0036

1533-6271

A. Wilson Greene,

American Constitutional Law and Politics

OPPORTUNITY TO THE SOUTH: MEADE VERSUS JACKSON AT FREDERICKSBURG A. Wilson Greene Private Benjamin Ashenfelter of the 6th Pennsylvania Reserves described the experience as "the worst disaster to our army since the war began." Another soldier in the Army of the Potomac declared, "I do not recollect of ever feeling so discouraged over the result of anything we ever undertook to do."1 These observations followed the Battle of Fredericksburg in December 1862. To most students of the Civil War, such references create images of towering Marye's Heights and the terrible stone wall, both blazing with Confederate fire. Yet, Ashenfelter and his comrade never saw these landmarks. They fought their battle of Fredericksburg four and one-half miles south of the city, in a bloody engagement frequently overshadowed by the more famous futility at the Sunken Road. Nevertheless , the combat which pitted Lee's most famous lieutenant against the man who would lead the Army of the Potomac longer than any other individual, represented the Federals' only opportunity to avert what became their most lopsided defeat of the war in Virginia. The campaign for Fredericksburgbegan on an optimistic note for the Unionists. In early November, President Lincoln replaced the dilatory George Brinton McClellan with Rhode Island's leading military figure, Ambrose Everett Burnside. Once convinced to accept command, Burnside reorganized the army into three Grand Divisions under Edwin Vose Sumner, Joseph Hooker, and William Buel Franklin, and moved his forces southeast from Warrenton toward Fredericksburg. By doing so, he hoped to cross the Rappahannock River quickly at the old colonial town, and move directly south toward Richmond before Lee could react. Bumside's pontoons failed to arrive with his infantry, and the new 1 Benjamin F. Ashenfelter to Father Churchman, Dec. 23, 1862, Harrisburg Civil War Round TableCollection (hereafter cited as HCWRTC), United States Army Military History Institute (hereafter cited as USAMHI); Freeman Cleaves, Meade of Gettysburg (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1960), 92. Civil War History, Vol. XXXIII, No. 4, ß 1987 by The Kent State University Press 296civil war history Yankee commander squandered the advantage of his swift march by procrastinating on the left bank of the river. As early as November 22, Maj. Gen. George Gordon Meade, a division commander in John Reynolds 's First Corps, expressed doubt as to the potential success of the campaign due to the delay in crossing the Rappahannock. Prophetically, he suggested that the way to capture Richmond would be to sever the railroads leading to it from the south and southwest, an operation over which he would preside some two years later! But for now, Meade and the rest of the Army of the Potomac would wait until Burnside made his decision to span the stream.2 Those orders came at last on December 11. Franklin's Grand Division, consisting of Reynolds's troops and William Farrar Smith's Sixth Corps, crossed on the bridges farthest downstream from the town. Unlike their comrades in Fredericksburg, the Left Grand Division encountered little resistance, and easily secured the right bank on the eleventh. The bulk of Franklin's men marched across the next day, serenaded by regimental bands playing gay tunes, including Dixie, which according to Luther Fürst of the 10th Pennsylvania Reserves, "cheered up the troops."3 Franklin watched as the last of his soldiers cleared the bridges at 1:00 PM He placed Smith's corps on his right and Reynolds's on his left. While most of the Federals faced generally west with their backs to the river, Meade's division formed practically a right angle to the main line, its left anchored on the Rappahannock to prevent surprise attacks from downstream. Thirty-six guns protected the bridgehead. Later, Daniel Sickles's and David Birney's divisions from Hooker's command marched into position to cross Franklin's pontoons at a moment's notice, which gave that officer significant reserve infantry. Counting these troops, a division from the Ninth Corps, and 3,500 men of George Bayard's cavalry division, Franklin controlled some60,000 soldiers, more than half of Burnside's army.4 Onceestablished on the far bank, Franklin threw skirmishers forward and, joined by Reynolds and Smith, began...