With Lee in Virginia: A Story of the American Civil War by G. A. Henty (feel good fiction books TXT) 📖

the swampy and difficult nature of the country, and the concealment afforded by the forest, which rendered it difficult for the enemy to discover the weakness of the defenders.

He posted 6000 men at Yorktown and Gloucester Point, and the remaining 5000 troops under his command were scattered along the line of works to the Warwick River. He knew that if McClellan pushed forward with all his force he must be successful; but he knew also that, if the enemy could be held in check for a few days, assistance would reach him from General Johnston's army.

Fortunately for the Confederates the weather, which had been fine and clear during the previous week, changed on the very day that McClellan started. The rain came down in torrents, and the roads became almost impassable. The columns struggled on along the deep and muddy tracks all day, and bivouacked for the night in the forests. The next morning they resumed their march, and on reaching the first line of intrenchments formed by the Confederates found them deserted, and it was not until they approached the Warwick Creek that they encountered serious opposition. Had they pushed forward at once they would have unquestionably captured Richmond. But McClellan's fault was over-caution, and he believed himself opposed by a very much larger force than that under the command of Magruder; consequently, instead of making an attack at once, he began regular siege operations against the works on Warwick Creek and those at Yorktown.

The delay saved Richmond. Every day re-enforcements arrived, and by the time that McClellan's army, over 100,000 strong, had erected their batteries and got their heavy guns[Pg 121] into position, Magruder had been re-enforced by some 10,000 men under General Johnston, who now assumed the command, while other divisions were hurrying up from Northern and Western Virginia. Upon the very night before the batteries were ready to open, the Confederates evacuated their positions and fell back, carrying with them all their guns and stores to the Chickahominy River, which ran almost across the peninsula at a distance of six miles only from Richmond.

The Confederates crossed and broke down the bridges, and prepared to make another stand. The disappointment of the Federals was great. After ten days of incessant labor and hardship they had only gained possession of the village of Yorktown, and a tract of low, swampy country. The divisions in front pressed forward rapidly after the Confederates; but these had managed their plan so well that all were safely across the stream before they were overtaken.

The dismay in Richmond had for a few days been great. Many people left the town for the interior, taking their valuables with them, and all was prepared for the removal of the State papers and documents. But as the Federals went on with their fortifications, and the re-enforcements began to arrive, confidence was restored, and all went on as before.

The great Federal army was so scattered through the forests, and the discipline of some of the divisions was so lax, that it was some days before McClellan had them ranged in order on the Chickahominy. Another week elapsed before he was in a position to undertake fresh operations; but General Johnston had now four divisions on the spot, and he was too enterprising a general to await the attack. Consequently he crossed the Chickahominy, fell upon one of the Federal divisions and almost destroyed it, and drove back the whole of their left wing. The next morning the battle was renewed, and lasted for five hours.

It was fortunate indeed for the Confederates that the right wing of the Northern army did not, while the action was going on, cross[Pg 122] the river and march straight upon Richmond; but communication was difficult from one part of the army to another, owing to the thick forests and the swampy state of the ground, and being without orders they remained inactive all day. The loss on their side had been 7000 men, while the Confederates had lost 4500; and General Johnston being seriously wounded, the chief command was given to General Lee, by far the ablest soldier the war produced. Satisfied with the success they had gained, the Confederates fell back across the river again.

On the 4th of June, General Stuart—for he had now been promoted—started with 1200 cavalry and two guns and in forty-eight hours made one of the most adventurous reconnoissances ever undertaken. First the force rode out to Hanover Courthouse, where they encountered and defeated, first, a small body of cavalry, and afterward a whole regiment. Then, after destroying the stores there, they rode round to the Pamunky, burned two vessels and a large quantity of stores, captured a train of forty wagons, and burned a railway bridge.

Then they passed right round the Federal rear, crossed the river, and re-entered the city with 165 prisoners and 200 horses, having effected the destruction of vast quantities of stores, besides breaking up the railways and burning bridges.

Toward the end of June McClellan learned that Stonewall Jackson, having struck heavy blows at the two greatly superior armies which were operating against him in the valley of the Shenandoah, had succeeded in evading them, and was marching toward Richmond.

He had just completed several bridges across the river, and was about to move forward to fight a great battle when the news reached him. Believing that he should be opposed by an army of 200,000 men, although, in fact, the Confederate army, after Jackson and all the available re-enforcements came up, was still somewhat inferior in strength to his own, he determined to abandon for the present the attempt upon Richmond, and to fall back upon the James River.

[Pg 123]

Here his ships had already landed stores for his supply, for the river was now open as far as the Confederate defenses at Fort Darling. Norfolk Navy Yard had been captured by the 10,000 men who formed the garrison of Fortress Monroe. No resistance had been offered, as all the Confederate troops had been concentrated for the defense of Richmond. When Norfolk was captured the Merrimac steamed out to make her way out of the river; but the water was low, and the pilot declared that she could not be taken up. Consequently she was set on fire and burned to the water's edge, and thus the main obstacle to the advance of the Federal fleet was removed.

They had advanced as far as Fort Darling, and the ironclad gunboats had engaged the batteries there. Their shot, however, did little damage to the defenders upon the lofty bluffs, while the shot from the batteries so injured the gunboats that the attempt to force the passage was abandoned. While falling back to a place called Harrison's Landing on the James River, the Federals were attacked by the Confederates, but after desperate fighting on both sides, lasting for five days, they succeeded in drawing off from the Chickahominy with a loss of fifty guns, thousands of small-arms, and the loss of the greater part of their stores.

All idea of a further advance against Richmond was for the present abandoned. President Lincoln had always been opposed to the plan, and a considerable portion of the army was moved round to join the force under General Pope, which was now to march upon Richmond from the north.

From the commencement of the Federal advance to the time when, beaten and dispirited, they regained the James River, Vincent Wingfield had seen little of his family. The Federal lines had at one time been within a mile of the Orangery. The slaves had some days before been all sent into the interior, and Mrs. Wingfield and her daughters had moved into Richmond, where they joined in the work, to which the whole of the ladies of the town and neighbo[Pg 124]rhood devoted themselves, of attending to the wounded, of whom, while the fighting was going on, long trains arrived every day at the city.

Vincent himself had taken no active part in the fighting. Magruder's division had not been engaged in the first attack upon McClellan's force; and although it had taken a share in the subsequent severe fighting, Vincent had been occupied in carrying messages from the general to the leaders of the other divisions, and had only once or twice come under the storm of fire to which the Confederates were exposed as they plunged through the morasses to attack the enemy. As soon as it was certain that the attack was finally abandoned, and that McClellan's troops were being withdrawn to strengthen Pope's army, Vincent resigned his appointment as aid-de-camp, and was appointed to the 7th Virginia Cavalry, stationed at Orange, where it was facing the Federal cavalry. Major Ashley had fallen while protecting the passage of Jackson's division, when hard pressed by one of the Federal armies in West Virginia.

No action in the war had been more brilliant than the manner in which Stonewall Jackson had baffled the two armies—each greatly superior in force to his own—that had been specially appointed to destroy him if possible, or at any rate to prevent his withdrawing from the Shenandoah Valley and marching to aid in the defense of the Confederate capital. His troops had marched almost day and night, without food, and depending entirely upon such supplies as they could obtain from the scattered farmhouses they passed.

Although Richmond was for the present safe, the prospect of the Confederates was by no means bright. New Orleans had been captured; the blockade of the other ports was now so strict that it was difficult in the extreme for a vessel to make her way in or out; and the Northerners had placed flotillas of gunboats on the rivers, and by the aid of these were gradually making their way into the heart of several of the States.

"Are you thinking of going out to the Orangery again soon, mother?" Vincent asked on the evening before setting out on t[Pg 125]he march north.

"I think not, Vincent. There is so much to do in the hospitals here that I cannot leave. I should be ashamed to be living in luxury at the Orangery with the girls while other women are giving up their whole time nursing the wounded. Besides, although I do not anticipate that after the way they have been hurled back the Northerners will try again for some time, now they are in possession of Harrison's Landing they can at any moment advance. Besides, it is not pleasant being obliged to turn out of one's house and leave everything to their mercy. I wrote yesterday to Pearson to bring the slaves back at once and take up the work, and I shall go over occasionally to see that everything is in order; but at any rate for a time we will stop here."

"I think that is best, mother. Certainly I should feel more comfortable knowing that you are all at Richmond than alone out there."

"We should be no worse off than thousands of ladies all over the State, Vincent. There are whole districts where every white capable of using a gun has gone to the war, leaving nothing but women and slaves behind, and we have not heard of a single case in which there has been trouble."

"Certainly there is no chance of trouble with your slaves, mother; but in some of the other plantations it may not be so. At any rate the quiet conduct of the slaves everywhere is the very best answer that could be given to the accusations that have been made as to their cruel treatment. At present the whole of the property of the slave-owners throughout the Southern States is at their mercy, and they might burn, kill, and destroy; and yet in no single instance have they risen against what are called their oppressors, even when the Federals have been close at hand.

"Please keep your eye on Dinah, mother. I distrust that fellow Jackson so thoroughly that I believe him capable of having her carried off and smuggled away somewhere[Pg 126] down south, and sold there if he saw a chance. I wish, instead of sending her to the Orangery, you would keep her as one of your servants here."

"I will if you wish it, Vincent; but I cannot believe for a moment that Jackson or anyone else would venture to meddle with any of my slaves."

"Perhaps not, mother; but it is best to be on the safe side. Anyhow, I shall be glad to know that she is with you. Young Jackson will be away, for I know he is in one of Stuart's troops of horse, though I have never happened to run against him since the war began."

The firing had hardly ceased before Harrison's Landing, when General Jackson, with a force of about 15,000 men, composed of his own division, now commanded by General Winder, General Ewell's division,