Eighty-fourth Regiment, Pennsylvania Volunteers (Infantry.) by Thomas Edward Merchant

Author:Thomas Edward Merchant [Merchant, Thomas Edward]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Nonfiction, History
ISBN: 4064066097004
Publisher: Good Press
Published: 2021-05-19T04:00:00+00:00

Battle of Chancellorsville.

April 29th, when the Army broke camp and started on a campaign intended to be brief, but sharp and decisive, fruitful of great and important results.

It was Hooker's plan, most intelligently conceived and thorough in its details. Without Jackson on the other side, it would have gone down in history as the battle of the War, and Hooker would have been the Lieutenant-General. No rebel army would thereafter have crossed the Potomac to make a Gettysburg. The Gettysburg of the War would have been on Southern soil.

The Regiment participated in the feint to the left of Fredericksburg, and on the

1st of May, moved toward Chancellorsville, the place of the campaign, crossing the Rappahannock at United States Ford.

On the 2d, late in the afternoon, Sickles was ordered to send two Divisions, the 2d and 3d, in the direction of the Old Furnace, to cut off the march of rebel troops toward the right of our line. Jackson, however, as was his custom, had already passed by and out of the way, excepting a regiment, which was captured.

While two-thirds of Sickles' Corps was in this exposed position, Jackson literally fell on the 11th Corps, away to the right of the Union line, at a time when the whole of that Corps was lying in supposed security, doubled it up, and in this way substituted the Field plan of Lee for the Camp study of Hooker; and Chancellorsville was become a ground to fight on but not a place of victory.

In the words of that memorable Order, the "Enemy was in a bag." But where was the string?

However, there was virtue in the situation, in that it furnished the grandest test that could have been presented to the Army of the Potomac. Most fully defeated, yet not alarmed. Line broken, yet not pursued.

Hooker's Army was a body of positive soldiery, who knew not on that 2d of May, nor until well back on sure ground, how nearly Lee had gained what Hooker started out to accomplish.

Back from the Old Furnace came the two Divisions of Sickles', while Keenan, with his Battalion of Cavalry, held the whole rebel force, to make time for the planting of the guns, and lessen the time for the falling of the night, which was to be the safeguard of our Army.

The next morning found our Brigade too far out, and where it would not have remained through the night had its position and number been known to the occupants of the woods along the line of which it was posted.

The Brigade was drawn back in the direction of the Chancellor House, and put behind a short line of light breast-works, in an isolated position, without any support to the right or left. We had been closely followed in our withdrawal of the morning, and were now hard pressed by the enemy forcing in upon our front, while a large force could be seen moving some distance on our left, which, within a half-hour, coming through the woods and over the rise to our rear, were immediately at our back before their coming was known.

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