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- [00:00]
Don Wildman
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- [00:32]
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- [02:03]
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- [02:38]
Don Wildman
It is the spring of 1863 at the Tail end of April, with the American Civil War now dragging into its third brutal year with no end in sight over the preceding months of winter, a tense Coiled calm has descended on this region of northeastern Virginia where the Rappahannock flows. Here, on either side of that river, two armies are encamped, watching each other closely. To the north is the Union, vast in its numbers and newly led by the confident Major General Joseph Hooker, who is planning an imminent attack across the river. The Confederates to the south, smaller in their numbers, are led by Robert E. Lee, who has dug in on the defensive. Their forces will meet in a tangled wilderness near a quiet crossroads called Chancellorsville. Hooker, believing he has outmaneuvered his wily opponent. But Lee has other plans in store, and what transpires will prove to be one of the most dangerous gambles of the war, in which one side will win, but at an unimaginable cost. I'm Don Wildman, and this is is American history hit? Our guest today is Dr. Bradford Weinman, adjunct professor at Georgetown University center for Security Studies. He has written extensively about the Chancellorsville campaign, published as part of the U.S. army campaigns of the Civil War series. Hello, Brad. Nice of you to join us. Let's discuss the Battle of Chancellorsville.
- [04:20]
Dr. Bradford Weinman
Indeed. Let's do it.
- [04:21]
Don Wildman
Context is everything with these big Civil War battles. So where are we at and what's at stake at the end of April 1863?
- [04:30]
Dr. Bradford Weinman
Sure. I think a great place to start this conversation is actually a callback to your Fredericksburg episode. I think your guest, Chris Makowski, did an absolutely exceptional job of encapsulating that campaign and that battle. And so. So for your listeners, if you want to start this episode right at the end of where you left off with the Fredericksburg episode, I think it's a good place to ultimately link both of these campaigns. And so with the Union defeat at Gettysburg, the Union army is going to retreat back across the Rappahannock river. And the impact of this failure is going to have a devastating effect both on the Union army and on the Union populace and politics. Burnside is going to be extremely embarrassed by this. He's going to attempt one more offensive here in the end of December of 1862 with the famous mud march, which ends up being an even bigger disaster. And so this is going to cause a great amount of discontent inside the army of the Potomac and inside the U.S. white House here to the point of where after the march, there's going to be a pretty public cabal to get Burnside removed. And there's a lot of intrigue inside of his officer corps. And so this will eventually prompt Abraham Lincoln to remove him at the end of January of 1863, and try to find a new path for this demoralized army. So overall, we're back to kind of a stalemate here on the Rappahannock river with the Union on one side and the Confederate army on the other side. So it's really not good for either army. As we move into 1863, we're really
- [05:51]
Don Wildman
talking at this point of two wars at once, the western theater and the eastern theater. The Union having made some strong advances the previous winter, consolidating its hold over key positions on the Mississippi river, heading towards the whole Vicksburg episode. And that that will come later. In the east, though, it's not been going well. I mean, as you mentioned, the. The battle of Fredericksburg is everything in this story. During the previous winter saw the largest number of troops at a single battle, resulting in a Confederate victory. And I want to remind folks that the Union had suffered twice as many casualties as the Confederates at that battle of Fredericksburg, which is a terrible situation that leads to all the leadership change. Let's talk about the replacement Union Major General Joseph Hooker, fighting Joe. What was he like?
- [06:38]
Dr. Bradford Weinman
Indeed. Yeah. So Joseph Hooker is a West Point graduate. He was a veteran of the regular army, served in the Mexican War, and by this point in the American Civil War, he had established a very solid reputation for both his competence and his aggressiveness, both of which had been kind of lacking at this point. And so he is going to sort of move his way up the ranks from brigade to division to corps command here. And so that is going to sort of draw the attention of Lincoln and lead to his appointment there. So we also need to kind of counterbalance that with his sort of reputation for having a bit of an ego and being very ambitious. But it is a noted sort of contrast in sort of personality and leadership styles with his predecessors.
- [07:18]
Don Wildman
So in general, no pun intended, the leadership of this army is, for Lincoln moving from this sort of reluctant, methodical McClellan stance to eventually Grant. Hooker's an important stepping stone in that process, isn't he?
- [07:35]
Dr. Bradford Weinman
I believe so. He definitely brings a more kind of aggressive and offensive style juxtapose against kind of the caution of McClellan and Burnside. And Lincoln is willing to sort of take a chance on Hooker's very sort of transparent sort of personal agenda, as some people sort of interpreted it, as long as he could produce military victories in there. And so, because at this point, the Union war effort is of a real nadir as we move into 1863, the 1862 midterm elections had not Gone. Well, for the Republicans, the very lopsided defeat of Fredericksburg is just going to kind of put this pall over the Union war effort. And then the issuing of the Emancipation Proclamation is going to have some very mixed sort of reactions amongst the Union populace in there. So Abraham Lincoln and his administration are just very starving for something positive to happen here militarily. And so they're hoping Hooker's the guy.
- [08:30]
Don Wildman
Well, in that regard, he is. I mean, he's got. He's younger and more energetic. I have a quote of his here. He says, my plans are perfect, and when I start to carry them out, may God have mercy on General Lee, for I will have none. The Union is lacking nothing in the ego department, is it?
- [08:47]
Dr. Bradford Weinman
Yeah, it's whether you want to call it confidence or call it ego, again, that's opening up to interpretation. But it's just a real injection that this army sort of needs at this time to give it some kind of positive direction.
- [09:03]
Don Wildman
Well, we'll talk about why he felt so confident in a moment, but for now, let's talk about the other side, a man we've discussed many times and will continue to discuss. General Robert E. Lee commands the army of Northern Virginia. By this point in the war, he's really a living legend for his leadership and battlefield tactics, fighting the Union to a standstill at Antietam, then repelling their attacks to this devastating effect at Fredericksburg. Everything the Union thought this would be as a war is countered by Robert E. Lee, essentially, and his ability to move in the battlefield. But there is another name that I want you to comment on which will become fatefully associated with Transfersville, and that is Lieutenant General Thomas J. Stonewall Jackson. Stonewall. One of the great names of the Civil War.
- [09:47]
Dr. Bradford Weinman
Yeah. So I think at this point, both Lee and, to a lesser extent, Jackson really sort of represent the broader hope and become the personification of the rebellion itself. Lee, of course, is going to sort of embody the trust of everybody around him. Both his political leadership, his subordinate officers, the army, and the people just absolutely celebrate him. And then, by extension, Jackson had also earned a comparable reputation, almost as celebrated as Lee, both inside and outside of the Confederacy, because of what he had accomplished both independently and with Lee in the army of Northern Virginia. Another point to mention here is the real solidification of their both professional and personal relationship by this point in 1863. I'd say that Lee is really taking advantage of two aspects of Jackson here. One, his ability to act independently as an operational commander, where he could give him sort of freedom of action to execute mission type orders, and then also depending upon him more for counsel. You see him depend upon both Jackson and James Longstreet as sort of sort of confidants when coming up with issues of strategy or kind of operational plans. And so we see him lean on that more heavily here in the winter of 1863, particularly when James Longstreet is going to be detached here later in the winter here. That Stonewall Jackson really becomes his real right hand man.
- [11:11]
Don Wildman
I mean, he'd been in for the long haul. He was right in the battle he joins after the battle of Fort Sumter. He gains that nickname Stonewall, after his conduct, his distinguished conduct, leading a brigade in the first battle of Bull Run. So he's been there all the way along. And he's very famous for his, I wouldn't call bravado, that's the wrong word for it, but he's a very courageous officer, I suppose, has a remarkable attachment to his troops, as all of those guys do. But where did the Stonewall come from?
- [11:40]
Dr. Bradford Weinman
That's actually a controversial story from his performance at the Battle of First Manassas in July of 1861. Whether the story is true or whether it's apocryphal, as the Confederate troops were being overwhelmed by a Union attack, Jackson with his brigade standing on Henry Hill were basically the only real defense that were holding their ground as the rest of this very amateurish Confederate army was retreating. In one of Jackson's colleagues, a general by the name of Bernard Bee, looked to his own troops who were retreating and pointed to the Jackson's brigade and say, look, there stands Jackson like a stone wall rally around the Virginians. And that allegedly was the turning of the battle. Now, did Bee really say that? Was he saying that as a point of rallying or whether that was an insult? There's all kinds of historiography trying to unpack its authenticity and its intent, but nonetheless, a great nickname is a great nickname. So that stuck, and that has become his moniker ever since.
- [12:33]
Don Wildman
Brad, we're going to take a short break, but I want to ask you before we go to that, why should people be interested in the battle of Chancellorsville? What distinguishes this battle from those that have gone before?
- [12:44]
Dr. Bradford Weinman
I think it is one of the most sort of overlooked, as it's in this very kind of interesting place between Fredericksburg and Gettysburg, which have their own sort of captivating narratives. And I also think it's one that is sort of impacted by sort of mythology and sort of interesting almost fairy tale stories about both the participants and the actions in there. And so I think there's a lot of place to really sort of appreciate how this was impactful kind of operationally and strategically for both the Union and Confederate militaries.
- [13:11]
Don Wildman
I don't know if listeners feel the same way I do, but I've been overwhelmed by how many battles there are in the Civil War and their various levels of importance and so forth. And it's really fun for me doing these episodes to finally stitch together and connect the dots on how each one leads to the next. It's a real stepping stone process once you get into it, but most people don't get into it because there's so much to learn. So we're kind of in that first phase of the war, pre Gettysburg, which proves to be such a pivotal moment, the 1861-63 time, which is this time that the Union is learning. Oh my goodness, we're in for a major war here, where we thought it was going to be a walk in the park, certainly at the beginning. But then it becomes worse and worse and worse as this time goes, that Lincoln is trying to find his right leader. So let's take this break and we'll come back and talk about the battle itself. This episode brought to you by Best Western Hotels and Resorts. Ah, spring. Trees blossoming, flowers blooming, not having to defrost your fingers and toes when you get inside. Oh yeah, and spring break freedom, warmer climes and memories just waiting to be made. And at Best Western, spring break isn't just what it used to be. It's better this spring. Stay three nights and get a $50 Best Western gift card. Life's a trip. Make the most of it at best Western. Visit bestwestern.com for complete terms and conditions.
- [14:43]
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- [15:02]
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- [16:04]
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- [16:20]
Dr. Bradford Weinman
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- [16:21]
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- [16:43]
Don Wildman
We're back with author and professor Bradford Weinman discussing the Battle of Chancellorsville. Now to the action itself. As is so often the case in the Civil War, the Union has the advantage of numbers. But my goodness, is that the case here at Chancellorsville? It is gigantic. The Union army Something like 130,000 soldiers to the south's 60,000. I mean, twice as many more than for every good reason Hooker expects to pummel them. How does he plan to do this? And how will Lee counter?
- [17:12]
Dr. Bradford Weinman
Sure. So the greatest challenge here for Joseph Hooker as we entered the spring of 1863, is just sort of the operational landscape for him at this point. He's in the same sort of geographic dilemma that his predecessor was, is that he's on one side of the river. There's the river, the town of Fredericksburg, the heights beyond the town that have been well entrenched and defended by the Confederates in there. And so that ultimately limits the options at which he can sort of pursue here to actually get at and destroy Lee's army. And so after weighing a lot of the options and possibilities, he's going to embark upon a very bold strategy which demands a lot of moving parts. So his overall operational goal here is to bring back kind of offensive and maneuver to the army of the Potomac here. We also got to keep in mind here that this is part of a broader offensive strategy that you made reference before of other theaters. We Also got to keep in mind that other Union armies, both in Tennessee under General Rosecrans, are moving on an offensive, as well as Grant in the Vicksburg and Mississippi campaign. So there's a real impetus here to take the war to Robert E. Lee and the army of Northern Virginia. So his plan here is very bold. His objective here is to basically kind of pry Lee out of his defensive and get him out in the open, to potentially engage him sort of mano a mano here. So his first move is to actually deploy his cavalry upriver there and back behind the Confederate forces that are entrenched at Fredericksburg and basically cut off the lines of communication that they had with Richmond, which was their sole source of supply. So that would basically have them kind of hanging out there very vulnerable. His next move is to actually take three of his army corps, move them up the Rappahannock river across, and basically get on Lee's left flank west of Fredericksburg in the Wilderness, eventually have two more corps following trees, and then at the same time, execute a diversion in front of Fredericksburg to basically hold and pin Lee's army in place. And so the ultimate end state of this is to put Lee on the horns of a dilemma. Or as Hooker cleverly summarized, the enemy must ingloriously fly or come out from behind his defenses and give me battle on ground of my own choosing. Basically saying Lee's going to have two options. That knowing that he's basically compromised with his lines of communication cut off and a force here on his exposed left flank that will force him to retreat towards Richmond, or he's going to have to come out from Fredericksburg somewhere west of the town and, you know, fight the army of the Potomac in sort of. Sort of an even engagement.
- [19:43]
Don Wildman
Interesting. It's a pincer movement, isn't it?
- [19:45]
Dr. Bradford Weinman
Yeah, it is. It's a big turning movement. Yeah.
- [19:47]
Don Wildman
Right. Despite those smaller numbers, Lee was not interested in this retreat that he would naturally do. Perhaps he plans to negate the Union's advantage in numbers by stalling Hooker's forces in the wilderness. So we have Joe Hooker on the move. He's going to command this battlefield. As far as he's concerned, for every good reason he has so many more men, he creates this pincer move, expecting what of Robert E. Lee at that point?
- [20:16]
Dr. Bradford Weinman
Again, he thinks that he's going to give Lee basically two options, basically to actually retreat and move back towards Richmond or to, you know, come out from the Fredericksburg defenses and kind of fight him out in the open, where he would actually Have a reasonable chance at defeating him and destroying the army.
- [20:32]
Don Wildman
And what does Lee choose to do?
- [20:34]
Dr. Bradford Weinman
Strangely enough, we're going to have a very unique and not too often seen phenomenon that Lee is sort of in react mode here. When he learns that the army of the Potomac is on the move, and when he gets intelligence that they have crossed upriver, he's going to take some time to sort of figure out if this is ultimately real or not, if this is a genuine threat or what the intent here is of these Union forces. And so for about 24 to 48 hours, Lee is trying to sort of figure things out and ultimately assess what the Union army is trying to do. And so that actually gives Hooker's plan a window of advantage here to basically set things up. And so after observing what was happening off to his west and then observing this demonstration that was happening in Fredericksburg, he makes the assessment that this Fredericksburg demonstration is not real. There's a real threat off to my left here. And so he is going to take the preponderance of his force out into the wilderness to meet the sizable force that is forming out just west of Fredericksburg.
- [21:29]
Don Wildman
Gotcha. Just to orient folks here, because nobody's looking at any maps here, we gotta be careful. This all takes place over about a six day period. The main fighting is May 1st through the 3rd. But all these maneuvers that you're talking about are prior to that and take some time. What will distinguish this battle is the audacity of Lee's choice of Lee's surprising strategy, which is what you read about in every account of this battle. He's going to do something that's really counterintuitive, isn't he?
- [21:59]
Dr. Bradford Weinman
He is. And he's put in a situation where he really doesn't have that many choices, as you noted. You know, he's already at a paucity of manpower here at this point. You know, I mentioned very quickly in passing that he has already detached two of his divisions down to the Suffolk area To deal with the union threat down there and to also do some foraging in there. So he's already had a manpower shortage, you know, outnumbered two to one. Knowing that the enemy has taken the initiative and they are kind of operating sort of aggressively here, it forces him to react and take some chances, not the least of which is having to divide his forces in the presence of a numerically superior enemy, for sure here. And so that's just kind of adding onto the risk that he's going to continue to assume throughout this campaign.
- [22:42]
Don Wildman
He famously did this in another battle prior to this, didn't he? Antietam.
- [22:45]
Dr. Bradford Weinman
Right, Antietam. The second Manassas campaign. Like this has sort of become his go to move. But again, a lot of it is just kind of prompted by the. The operational realities of the army of Northern Virginia.
- [23:00]
Don Wildman
Right, but in the books, you don't divide your troops in the face of overwhelming numbers. That seems like a crazy thing to do. But that's how he handles this situation several different times, very famously and most so here, I would say this is where it really is most effective or can be tracked so much. So Hooker's forces advance into the wilderness. It's called Explain the Wilderness. We're going to hear about this in several different battles along the way. What are we talking about when we say wilderness?
- [23:27]
Dr. Bradford Weinman
So about 10 miles west of the city of Fredericksburg, there is about a 20 mile by 20 mile box of extraordinarily deep and dense forest that was just known colloquially as the wilderness by Virginians in that area. And so the terrain itself there is going to eventually play a major role. Not just the operation, but once we actually get fighting out there, it is going to become an extraordinarily challenging variable for both armies as they attempt to kind of engage in combat in there. It's because it's not very indicative of to mid 19th century sort of linear tactics that is going to become a real impediment for maneuver and for any kind of movement for both armies.
- [24:08]
Don Wildman
Right. And this is the story with the south fighting on their own ground. They know their. They develop tactics based on their own turf and their own geography. So he divides his forces. Lee, he sends the larger force towards Hooker's flank. Just east of Chancellorsville. Right. We're talking about Fredericksville. These are two places that are pretty far apart, right?
- [24:29]
Dr. Bradford Weinman
Yeah, about 10 or 12 miles or so. And when we say Chancellorsville, it always sounds like a large metropolis, but it is actually just one house in a clearing in the middle of the wilderness, which has become a rallying point for all these converging Union forces here at the end of April of 1863.
- [24:45]
Don Wildman
I see. So Lee leaves the balance of his forces to defend Fredericksburg and the two sides make contact. And it doesn't go well for the Union right away. They are pushed back. Talk to me about the fighting in the wilderness. This is in the wilderness, Right.
- [24:59]
Dr. Bradford Weinman
This is actually going to be west of the wilderness. So on the early afternoon of May 1, remember, Hooker thinks that he basically has a jump on Lee here, as he has been able to execute the first part of his plan from what he can tell, with little to no kind of recognition by Lee and his forces here. So he's sort of able to move without any sort of impediment or acknowledgement by the army of Northern Virginia. So on the early afternoon of May 1st, he's going to send out a pretty sizable reconnaissance in force eastward in there to basically secure another one of the fords across the Rappahannock and to establish a position on the high ground between Chancellorsville and Fredericksburg, and. And basically kind of force Lee to do something here at this point, knowing that he's got to jump on him. But what ends up happening out here east of the Wilderness is that he's going to surprisingly meet the. The preponderance of the Army, Northern Virginia. All of Stonewall Jackson's entire corps are basically going to slam into this undersized sort of reconnaissance force and overwhelm them the afternoon of May 1st.
- [25:59]
Don Wildman
Interesting. When you look at these maps, you know, a map of the Battle of Chancellorsville, there are so many names, so many units, so much is going on. It's impossible to believe that these guys could actually navigate this whole thing, you know, through. Through it, have it all organized the way they did. It's really amazing. And you have no answer for this. I'm just telling you from an outsider's perspective on military history, it's astonishing how complicated this gets. But this is all happening south of the Rappahannock River. Understand that. You know, six months before, we had a really bad thing happen, you know, upriver at Fredericksburg. It hasn't. We haven't moved much in this Eastern Theater from where we were before. So here we go again, but in a whole different situation. The sun comes up on May 2, and Lee and Jackson, Stonewall Jackson, have devised another plan to advance again. They split the already smaller force, which seems to be a thing for them now, and Jackson takes this force, swings down around the rear of Hooker's forces and. And hits them in a vicious attack. Take me from there.
- [27:07]
Dr. Bradford Weinman
Indeed. Yeah. So backing up a little bit to the evening of May 1st. So after that initial contact just east of the Wilderness, Hooker is going to surprisingly recall his forces and pull them back to the defensive position they had built around the Chancellor House, which is going to be its own controversy, which probably deserves its own podcast, as far as that decision to actually retrograde them back to where they started. Lee's forces are going to follow, but once they get into the proximity of the Chancellor House, they're going to basically hit the bulk of kind of the Union defensive position there. They will spend the rest of the evening on May 1, just kind of probing, trying to find a soft spot in there, but really not finding any opportunity. And so, as you mentioned, Lee and Jackson to get together that night to kind of figure out what are really the options here that they can do. And so, after a very lengthy night of discussion, they proposed this very audacious plan to take advantage of the far right of the Union line, which Lee's cavalry had said was quote, unquote, in the air. It wasn't anchored to anything potentially vulnerable. So the challenge was going to be taking advantage of that vulnerability. It would actually demand that Jackson take the entirety of his corps, 30,000 troops, march them through the wilderness on a very, very narrow path about 14 to 15 miles sort of north and west, to position them to eventually assault this far right of the Union flank, which was being covered by their 11th Corps here on May 2nd.
- [28:31]
Don Wildman
As a result, Union forces are forced to retreat again, and this time by over two miles. But it's important to recognize, and this is the story of this whole battle, The Confederacy suffers a major blow at this moment. I mean, a lot of bad things happen. But this is a headline. Stonewall Jackson is struck by his own men. Friendly fire. How does this happen? He is shot.
- [28:53]
Dr. Bradford Weinman
The initial assault after the flank march in there is going to meet overwhelming success. I mean, the Union army is caught almost completely unaware when they make first contact out there. And so the initial sort of energy of Jackson's attack is really going to start rolling up the Union flank. But as we get deeper into the evening in there, we see the Union army is actually going to react to this with sort of increasing fortitude and sort of slow the momentum of it. The challenge with the whole flank march is it took up the preponderance of the day. And so by the time it actually begins, it's about 5:36pm so Jackson has left himself a very limited amount of daylight in which to execute this. He had this very ambitious goal of actually getting behind the Union army and cutting them off from the river and basically kind of crushing them in place. But as we get into like 7:30, 8:00 clock and the sun is going down, the momentum of his attack is really starting to lose its energy and troops are getting lost, and it's much better. He's having very difficult time maintaining command and control. And so around 8:30 at night, it is almost completely dark. And Jackson's extraordinarily frustrated that he wasn't able to finish the job. So he's really being overtaken by his impatience. And so as it is getting dark, he is actually going to ride in front of the lines in there to sort of scout ahead to basically do some reconnaissance to continue the assault in the night, which is something very rare for the Civil War. But because of all of the confusion, he is going to be accidentally fired upon by some of his own troops and very severely wounded on the night of May 2nd.
- [30:28]
Don Wildman
Right. These are guys who were fighting all day and they're tired and they're on alert, and suddenly they see shapes in the forest coming at them. It happens to be Stonewall Jackson, and they shoot him. And he was on a horse, I imagine, right?
- [30:41]
Dr. Bradford Weinman
He was. He was there with a small staff, and he's going to be shot three times, twice in the arm and once in the hand. And so he will eventually have to be evacuated to the rear where his left arm is going to be amputated.
- [30:55]
Don Wildman
He doesn't die right away, but it's bad. So both sides have hunkered down at the end of May 2nd. We're coming up into May 3rd now, and basically what we've established is that Hooker has had to retreat two miles towards Chancellorsville. This is dragging him into the wilderness, I guess he was trying to avoid. Right.
- [31:15]
Dr. Bradford Weinman
It wasn't so much he was trying to avoid, it is that the Union army actually is tracking the movement of Confederate forces during the flank attack. But the small pieces of information that Hooker is receiving in the late morning and early afternoon of May 2nd is he actually think the Confederates are leaving the field, that they're retreating. And so he is going to spend a lot of his energy sort of mid afternoon, kind of transitioning his troops to pack up their stuff, and we're going to follow them in pursuit. And then the flank attack happens, and it totally changes all their calculus. And so he now transitions to a more defensive mindset here on the evening of the second. And so he anticipates that the Confederate army will wake up and continue their assault. So the challenge as we move into the 3rd of May here is that as successful as the flank attack was, it's basically going to divide the Confederate army again with the Union army in between them. You've got Lee on the east side and then Jackson's troops on the west side and the entire army of the Potomac in the middle around the Chancellor House. And so. So that is going to be the major dilemma here for the. For Lee's Army. As we move into May 3rd, this
- [32:16]
Don Wildman
May 3rd becomes the second bloodiest day in the entire Civil War. You put these many men, this many men next to each other, fighting it out, you're going to have a lot of casualties. We'll go over the numbers later on. It was so close in. I mean, it's such a laborious war to fight, isn't it? I mean, they have to pick up and move, and it's all about foot. And it's. It's just so difficult to fight this war, any war in those days, really. But in. Under these circumstances, especially in the. In what will be the wilderness, you can see the odds are stacked against everybody. Major General Hooker is actually knocked unconscious after a Confederate artillery shell detonates near him. At some point, the Union breaks through. Right. A guy named major General John Sedgwick actually makes. Makes progress.
- [33:05]
Dr. Bradford Weinman
He does. And so, just as Confederate troops, who have just been grinding all morning trying to reunite their two disparate halves, actually unite around the Chancellor house, there's this kind of temporary moment of triumph for Lee. But he is immediately given the information that that diversionary crossing that Hooker had set up a few days before had actually succeeded. And the Union 6th Corps, under General John Sedgwick, has actually overrun the leftover Confederates there, ironically, on breeze Heights in the stone wall, which had been the First Battle of Fredericksburg. This is the Second Battle of Fredericksburg that is going to happen on May 2 and May 3. And so Confederate defenders there, who are already outnumbered, are going to be overwhelmed. So Lee now has this new threat of an entire Union corps, the largest one, that is now coming westward to join with Hooker's forces.
- [33:53]
Don Wildman
How splayed out is this battle? I mean, are we talking about it being fairly centralized around the Chancellorsville at this point, or are there many different actions happening elsewhere?
- [34:02]
Dr. Bradford Weinman
Yeah. So at this point, you really sort of see what separates Chancellorsville from several of its predecessors is that because Hooker's plan had called for multiple forces moving at various times in there, it's now sort of spread throughout a good portion of Spotsylvania County. So you've got the main Union force, which is around the Chancellor house. You now have Sedgwick and his forces that are at Fredericksburg. You've got the Union cavalry, which is way south of Fredericksburg, and has really lost contact with the main Union forces. And you have Hooker trying to coordinate all of this with sort of the limited means of technology here in 1863. His chief of staff is actually back outside of Fredericksburg at Falmouth. And so they're having to use kind of telegraph to kind of coordinate all of these movements here throughout the campaign.
- [34:51]
Don Wildman
May 4, Lee counters Sedgwick's forces successfully, pushes him back to the river, forcing Sedgwick on May 5 to withdraw his forces across the Rappahannock in the early morning. We're starting to see the real failure here for the union. Hooker. One hell of a headache this guy must have at this moment.
- [35:09]
Dr. Bradford Weinman
Yeah.
- [35:09]
Don Wildman
Retreats. Having lost a lot of his previous gusto, he. He decides on a general retreat despite the. The wishes of many of his troops. There was a. There's a note from a soldier of the 151st Pennsylvania. Must we lose this battle? He says to himself, probably in a. In a journal, have these brave comrades who have fought so bravely died at their post in vain. Ugh. This was so much the mood of those early years for the unions. I mean, one battle after another, these horrible situations. This is a full on complete failure as far as, you know, major fighting Joe is concerned. Right?
- [35:49]
Dr. Bradford Weinman
It is. And you sort of see throughout the campaign sort of the transition from all of his confidence and bravado, you know, start to atrophy as, you know, his plan starts to unravel as the confederates counter his every move. And then by the end of this, as he has sort of transitioned to the defensive, he has this sort of one option. Okay, well, Sedgwick can't kind of come here and save us here. We sort of reverse the hammer and anvil dynamic. And then when he learns that Sedgwick has crossed back over the river without permission, we basically see Hooker sort of. Kind of give up on the enterprise here. And after a very bizarre consultation with his Corps commanders on May 5, just make the choice to retrograde the army across the river and basically kind of
- [36:31]
Don Wildman
concede defeat for the campaign, A clear confederate victory. And after this break, we'll discuss the difficult aftermath and its wider implications.
- [36:45]
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Don Wildman
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- [38:24]
Don Wildman
Against the odds Again, the Confederates have won the battle, but both sides have taken impossible casualties. Union army, army of the Potomac Total casualties, including missing and captured more than 17,000. Of those killed 1600 about wounded almost 10,000 9,700, they say Confederate army very similar numbers in a weird way. Killed about 1700 wounded 9200 total casualties, including the missing, captured about 13,000. So it's gone better for the Confederates. They win by sending the Union back across the Rappahannock. But boy, what a blow, huh?
- [39:04]
Dr. Bradford Weinman
It is. And I also find the immediate results of this campaign as fascinating because, you know, after the war, this is obviously heralded as Lee's greatest victory. And absolutely, to be sure, this is one, as we've discussed, that he took the greatest number of risks. He clearly out generals General Hooker and turns real disadvantage into advantage throughout the campaign. But I like to remind folks that on May 7, everybody is back where they started when the campaign began. They're covering the exact same positions as it were, except now both sides have much fewer people. And so Lee is very upset at this. You know, he's frustrated his subordinates that he let the Union army escape, and he has to now contend with all these losses and very little to show for it. Indeed, he stopped the Union assault across the river, but he really hasn't gained anything from this battle.
- [39:51]
Don Wildman
I always wonder about that, the amount of effort that it takes in logistics to get an army of this size back across a river. The Rappahannock's no small stream, and you would have thought at that time that Lee would have attacked. You know, that would be a prime opportunity to take it out. Right.
- [40:05]
Dr. Bradford Weinman
And he was about to. That was the orders that were going out for the morning of May 6th. But when they woke up, the entire Union army was gone. They'd gotten just about everybody across the river overnight. And Lee was just absolutely furious with his subordinates that they let that happen.
- [40:19]
Don Wildman
Wow. This kind of puts the nail in the coffin of the general strategy that the Union had to march to Richmond. Right. I mean, they've done it so many different times with the peninsula, with, you know, pretty much all that early phase of the war was let's just march down the way, it's not very far from D.C. to Richmond and we'll go take the capital. And over and over again they are thwarted in this Virginia, you know, actions that take on. And this is the last of those efforts, isn't it?
- [40:45]
Dr. Bradford Weinman
At least for the time being. The rest of May, the Union high command is really going to have to recalculate what the next move is. Hooker is going to be very reluctant to resume the offensive here. A lot of it is just because of numbers, because of the tremendous casualties that you had just mentioned. And the Union army of the Potomac is also going to lose a sizable portion of its manpower that had been bolstered by the nine month enlistees that they had gotten in the fall of the previous years. Those contracts are running out. And so his force is really starting to atrophy here. So there really isn't a lot of impetus to do something in the immediate. But again, the political repercussions of this defeat are really going to reverberate throughout the army and throughout the northern populace.
- [41:23]
Don Wildman
Tactical level, this is arguably Robert E. Lee's greatest victory, right?
- [41:27]
Dr. Bradford Weinman
I'd absolutely say so. Again, I think you've been really keen to mention all of the disadvantages he had throughout this as far as numbers and opportunities. And this is one where he, on a tactical level, took the most risks and one could say took a lot of gambles, but benefited from that sort of audacity, for sure.
- [41:46]
Don Wildman
Yeah, exactly. It's all going to turn around pretty quickly. But for this moment, his legend, he is glowing. The northern papers are writing about, everybody's writing about, and basically he's working up to the strategy of let's finally put the north on its heels and we will do that by marching back north. He tried it once before, but this is for real. They're going to go right into Pennsylvania and that leads to a Few months from now, Gettysburg. I want to talk about what happened to Stonewall Jackson. We mentioned it, but he had been shot, of course, and he had to have his arm amputated. At that point, he becomes ill with pneumonia. And eight days later, May 10, 1863, he falls into a state of delirium and eventually dies. How does this affect Robert E. Lee?
- [42:32]
Dr. Bradford Weinman
It's going to be a real blow to him both professionally and personally. Again, as we started this conversation that he had increasingly become so dependent upon him not just as a reliable subordinate commander, but also a sort of a counselor and a confidant in there. And so while Lee is just going to have to contend with the number of casualties that he took during the Chancellorsville campaign, it's going to be the loss of Jackson that really doesn't have a. A suitable replacement for. For all of his talent and all of his accomplishments. And so that's going to be a real blow to the Confederate high command.
- [43:04]
Don Wildman
For the Union. The defeat, you know, pile it on at this point. Terrible shock. Lincoln is quoted to have said, my God, my God, what will the country say? And boy, are they saying it all over the place. You know, we can't win this thing. In many people's opinion, Major General Hooker relieved several of his commanders for incompetence. Spent years blaming them for his loss. That's a revealing quality of his. He wouldn't remain in his post for much longer either. Lincoln chose to retain him initially, but relieved him of his post in the early days of the Gettysburg campaign, when that post will go to George Meade. Somewhat more successfully for the Confederacy. The Battle of Chancellorville has been labeled the perfect battle. I mean, or at least perfect battle considering the 2 to 1 discrepancy of manpower. But one could also argue that it is a costly victory that sets him up for the future failures that they will start to pile up themselves. It's a mixed reaction, joyful with victory, but sadness for the loss of his famed Stonewall Jackson. It really can create the conditions necessary for the Confederates to invade the North. It's fair to say that the Battle of Chancellorsville is act one of the most pivotal moment of the whole Civil War. Right.
- [44:17]
Dr. Bradford Weinman
I would completely agree. And it's just about a week after the conclusion of the campaign, there's going to be a very important conference that's going to happen in Richmond with the political and military command of the Confederacy in there where they're going to have to talk about grand strategy. The real prompt of that is going to be, it's looking like the inevitable or potential collapse of the Confederate forces out in Vicksburg. And so there's going to be a very intense debate about what the priority should be. Should it be the Eastern Theater or the Western Theater? And after Chancellorsville, this is where Lee is going to make his very assertive and aggressive proposal to make the Eastern Theater the priority, to basically give him what little resources the Confederacy had and make one more attempt at invading the North. As it is something that Lee had sort of committed to by the middle of 1862, that trying to understand what is it going to take militarily to win this war, to change the minds of Union politicians and Union voters to ultimately allow the Confederacy to have its independence. And he remained firmly committed that this had to be the result of some kind of victory on Northern soil. And so after Chancellorsville, that is going to be the process of him really making that case to Jefferson Davis and the War Department and setting all of those sort of logistical and administrative pieces in place for what will eventually become the Pennsylvania campaign here in a couple weeks.
- [45:39]
Don Wildman
I'm curious, Brad. I mean, I mentioned in your bio you write you're published as part of the U.S. army the Civil War series. What do you take away from these battles in the modern sense? Do you guys learn from these things as you're studying them? Do the cadets at West Point learn fighting tactics or the failure thereof? Is there relevancy to what happens?
- [45:58]
Dr. Bradford Weinman
100%. So this campaign is actually part. So my primary teaching post is at Marine Corps University at the Command of Staff College. And so we take our students, which are military officers, out on a Chancellorsville staff staff ride as part of the leadership curriculum, where we learned about decision making and contingency and kind of walk through step by step to put the students in the place and time of the commanders here in 1863. And to appreciate that, well, a lot of the narrative tends to sort of bifurcate the command there. That Lee is a genius and Hooker's kind of a dummy. But when he actually sort of walked through step by step where each commander was, you realized, okay, well, a lot of what Hooker decided made sense, and a lot of the choices that Lee made were kind of questionable. There's a lot of kind of contingency and fortune that sort of impacts both sides of the Army.
- [46:46]
Don Wildman
Yeah, it's easy to be the armchair quarterback, you know, 150 years later. But, I mean, I remind people, go to battlefields.org, they're called, and it's the American Battlefield trust who does such a great job of describing these battles. And you'll see the maps I'm talking about and how many names are in that wilderness, how many different units are going around. It's extraordinary. It's amazing. Dr. Bradford Weidman is adjunct professor at Georgetown University center for Security Studies. That sounds like a cool place to be. He has written extensively about the Civil War as part of the U.S. army campaigns of the Civil War series. Brad, where can people follow you closer?
- [47:26]
Dr. Bradford Weinman
I really don't have a social media presence, but one of the other monikers of the Battle of Chancellorsville is one where the Virginia Military Institute, my alma mater, distinguished itself. One of Jackson's last words was the institute will be heard from today when he saw the number of his former students and VMI graduates who are in his soon to be attacked there. So I have a book coming out here this fall called Francis H. Smith VMI and the Rise of Southern Military Education, which examines sort of the impact of southern military schools and kind of Southern identity and sort of the lead up to the Civil War. So if you want to check McFarland Press or Amazon, that's being pre ordered now.
- [48:04]
Don Wildman
So tell that title again.
- [48:07]
Dr. Bradford Weinman
So it's Francis H. Smith, VMI and the Rise of Southern Military Education.
- [48:11]
Don Wildman
Fascinating. Thanks so much for joining us. Really appreciate it.
- [48:14]
Dr. Bradford Weinman
All right, thank you, Don. Appreciate it.
- [48:17]
Don Wildman
Hey, thanks for listening to American History hit. You know, every week we release new episodes, two new episodes dropping Mondays and Thursdays. All kinds of content from mysterious missing colonies to powerful political movements to some of the biggest battles across the centuries. Don't miss an episode by hitting like and follow. You help us out, which is great. But you'll also be reminded when our shows are on. And while you're at it, share it with a friend. American History hit with me, Don Wildman.
- [48:46]
Dr. Bradford Weinman
So grateful for your support.
- [48:52]
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Dr. Bradford Weinman
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Dr. Bradford Weinman
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