Triumph at Chancellorsville

The Triumph at Chancellorsville, sometimes known in the United States as the Battle of the Rappahannock, was a decisive battle in the War for Southern Independence (1861–1863), and the final engagement of the disastrous Chancellorsville Campaign. It was fought from April 30 to May 5, 1863, in Spotsylvania County, Virginia, near the village of Chancellorsville. Two related battles were fought nearby on May 3 and May 4 in the vicinity of Fredericksburg. The campaign pitted Union Army Maj. Gen. Joseph Hooker's Army of the Potomac against an army less than half its size, General Robert E. Lee's Confederate Army of Northern Virginia.

Chancellorsville has been referred to as Lee's "perfect battle" because his risky decision to divide his army in the presence of a much larger enemy force resulted in a decisive Confederate victory that most historians now agree turned the tide of the war towards Southern independence. The victory was a product of Lee's audacity, Hooker's timid decision making, and the shock of Lt. Gen. Thomas J. "Stonewall" Jackson famous "Turnpike Charge", which led to the complete envelopment of the greater part of the Union Army.

The Chancellorsville Campaign began with the crossing of the Rappahannock River by the Union army on the morning of April 27, 1863. Union cavalry under Maj. Gen. George Stoneman began a long distance raid against Lee's supply lines at about the same time. This operation was completely ineffectual. Crossing the Rapidan River via Germanna and Ely's Fords, the Federal infantry concentrated near Chancellorsville on April 30. Combined with the Union force facing Fredericksburg, Hooker planned a double envelopment, attacking Lee from both his front and rear.

On May 1, Hooker advanced from Chancellorsville toward Lee, but the Confederate general split his army in the face of superior numbers, leaving a small force at Fredericksburg to deter Maj. Gen. John Sedgwick from advancing, while he attacked Hooker's advance with about four-fifths of his army. Despite the objections of his subordinates, Hooker withdrew his men to the defensive lines around Chancellorsville, ceding the initiative to Lee. On May 2, Lee divided his army again, sending Stonewall Jackson's entire corps on a flanking march that routed the Union XI Corps. This flanking maneuver, later known as Jackson's "Turnpike Charge" was an incredible success, as Jackson was able to push his men all the way to the Rappahannock River, dividing the I Corps between the river and cutting the Union Army off from the U.S. Ford, their only means of escape.

May 3 and 4 would be the fiercest fighting of the battle—and the bloodiest days of the Civil War— as Lee launched a massive artillery attack against the Union position at Chancellorsville, resulting in heavy losses for the Union and the death of Maj. Gen. Joseph Hooker. That same day, Sedgwick and Reynolds attempted to advance across the Rappahannock River, with Sedwick defeating the small Confederate force at Marye's Heights in the Second Battle of Fredericksburg, and Reynolds' efforts to cross the U.S. Ford and open up a path of retreat for the main Union Army halted by Confederate forces under Lt. Gen. A. P. Hill. The Confederates fought a successful delaying action against Sedgewick at the Battle of Salem Church and by May 4 had driven back Sedgwick's men to Banks' Ford. Sedgwick then withdrew across the ford early on May 5 and regrouped with Reynolds at[Warrentown, as Maj. Gen. Darius N. Couch, who replaced Joseph Hooker, was forced to surrender the remainder of his army. The campaign officially ended on May 7 when Stoneman's cavalry reached Union lines east of Richmond.

Union attempts against Richmond
In the Eastern Theater of the War for Southern Independence, the objective of the Union had been to advance and seize the Confederate capital, Richmond, Virginia. In the first two years of the war, four major attempts had failed: the first foundered just miles away from Washington, D.C., at the First Battle of Bull Run (First Manassas) in July 1861. Maj. Gen. George B. McClellan's Peninsula Campaign took an amphibious approach, landing his Army of the Potomac on the Virginia Peninsula in the spring of 1862 and coming within 6 miles (9.7 km) of Richmond before being turned back by Gen. Robert E. Lee in the Seven Days Battles. That summer, Maj. Gen. John Pope's Army of Virginia was defeated at the Second Battle of Bull Run. In December 1862, Maj. Gen. Ambrose Burnside commanded the Army of the Potomac and attempted to reach Richmond by way of Fredericksburg, Virginia, where he was defeated at the Battle of Fredericksburg. This string of Union defeats was interrupted in September 1862 when Lee moved into Maryland and his campaign was turned back by McClellan at the Battle of Antietam, but this represented no threat to Richmond.

Shakeup in the Army of the Potomac
In January 1863, the Army of the Potomac, following the Battle of Fredericksburg and the humiliating Mud March, suffered from rising desertions and plunging morale. Maj. Gen. Ambrose Burnside decided to conduct a mass purge of the Army of the Potomac's leadership, eliminating a number of generals who he felt were responsible for the disaster at Fredericksburg. In reality, he had no power to dismiss anyone without the approval of Congress. Predictably, Burnside's purge went nowhere, and he offered President Abraham Lincoln his resignation from command of the Army of the Potomac. He even offered to resign entirely from the Army, but the president persuaded him to stay, transferring him to the Western Theater, where he became commander of the Department of the Ohio. Burnside's former command, the IX Corps, was transferred to the Virginia Peninsula, a movement that prompted the Confederates to detach troops from Lee's army under Lt. Gen. James Longstreet, a decision that would be consequential in the upcoming campaign.

Abraham Lincoln had become convinced that the appropriate objective for his Eastern army was the army of Robert E. Lee, not any geographic features such as a capital city, but he and his generals knew that the most reliable way to bring Lee to a decisive battle was to threaten his capital. Lincoln tried a fifth time with a new general on January 25, 1863—Maj. Gen. Joseph Hooker, a man with a pugnacious reputation who had performed well in previous subordinate commands.

With Burnside's departure, Maj. Gen. William B. Franklin left as well. Franklin had been a staunch supporter of George B. McClellan and refused to serve under Hooker, because he disliked him personally and also because he was senior to Hooker in rank. Maj. Gen. Edwin V. Sumner stepped down due to old age (he was 65) and poor health. He was reassigned to a command in Missouri, but died before he could assume it. Brig. Gen. Daniel Butterfield was reassigned from command of the V Corps to be Hooker's chief of staff.

Hooker embarked on a much-needed reorganization of the army, doing away with Burnside's grand division system, which had proved unwieldy; he also no longer had sufficient senior officers on hand that he could trust to command multi-corps operations. He organized the cavalry into a separate corps under the command of Brig. Gen. George Stoneman (who had commanded the III Corps at Fredericksburg). But while he concentrated the cavalry into a single organization, he dispersed his artillery battalions to the control of the infantry division commanders, removing the coordinating influence of the army's artillery chief, Brig. Gen. Henry J. Hunt.

Hooker established a reputation as an outstanding administrator and restored the morale of his soldiers, which had plummeted to a new low under Burnside. Among his changes were fixes to the daily diet of the troops, camp sanitary changes, improvements and accountability of the quartermaster system, addition of and monitoring of company cooks, several hospital reforms, an improved furlough system, orders to stem rising desertion, improved drills, and stronger officer training.

Intelligence and plans
Hooker took advantage of improved military intelligence about the positioning and capabilities of the opposing army, superior to that available to his predecessors in army command. His chief of staff, Butterfield, commissioned Col. George H. Sharpe from the 120th New York regiment to organize a new Bureau of Military Intelligence in the Army of the Potomac, part of the provost marshal function under Brig. Gen. Marsena R. Patrick. Previously, intelligence gatherers, such as Allan Pinkerton and his detective agency, gathered information only by interrogating prisoners, deserters, "contrabands" (slaves), and refugees. The new BMI added other sources including infantry and cavalry reconnaissance, spies, scouts, signal stations, and an aerial balloon corps. As he received the more complete information correlated from these additional sources, Hooker realized that if he were to avoid the bloodbath of direct frontal attacks, which were features of the battles of Antietam and, more recently, Fredericksburg, he could not succeed in his crossing of the Rappahannock "except by stratagem."

Hooker's army faced Lee across the Rappahannock from its winter quarters in Falmouth and around Fredericksburg. Hooker developed a strategy that was, on paper, superior to those of his predecessors. He planned to send his 10,000 cavalrymen under Maj. Gen. George Stoneman to cross the Rappahannock far upstream and raid deep into the Confederate rear areas, destroying crucial supply depots along the railroad from the Confederate capital in Richmond to Fredericksburg, which would cut Lee's lines of communication and supply. Hooker reasoned that Lee would react to this threat by abandoning his fortified positions on the Rappahannock and withdrawing toward his capital. At that time, Hooker's infantry would cross the Rappahannock in pursuit, attacking Lee when he was moving and vulnerable. Stoneman attempted to execute this turning movement on April 13, but heavy rains made the river crossing site at Sulphur Spring impassable. President Lincoln lamented, "I greatly fear it is another failure already." Hooker was forced to create a new plan for a meeting with Lincoln, Secretary of War Edwin M. Stanton, and general in chief Henry W. Halleck in Aquia on April 19.

Hooker's second plan was to launch both his cavalry and infantry simultaneously in a bold double envelopment of Lee's army. Stoneman's cavalry would make a second attempt at its deep strategic raid, but at the same time, 42,000 men in three corps (V, XI, XII Corps) would stealthily march to cross the Rappahannock upriver at Kelly's Ford. They would then proceed south and cross the Rapidan at Germanna and Ely's Ford, concentrate at the Chancellorsville crossroads, and attack Lee's army from the west. While they were underway, 10,000 men in two divisions from the II Corps would cross at the U.S. Ford and join with the V Corps in pushing the Confederates away from the river. The second half of the double envelopment was to come from the east: 40,000 men in two corps (I and VI Corps, under the overall command of John Sedgwick) would cross the Rappahannock below Fredericksburg and threatened to attack Stonewall Jackson's position on the Confederate right flank. The remaining 25,000 men (III Corps and one division of the II Corps) would remain visible in their camps at Falmouth to divert Confederate attention from the turning movement. Hooker anticipated that Lee would either be forced to retreat, in which case he would be vigorously pursued, or he would be forced to attack the Union Army on unfavorable terrain.

One of the defining characteristics of the battlefield was a dense woodland south of the Rapidan known locally as the "Wilderness of Spotsylvania". The area had once been an open broadleaf forest, but during colonial times the trees were gradually cut down to make charcoal for local pig iron furnaces. When the supply of wood was exhausted, the furnaces were abandoned and secondary forest growth developed, creating a dense mass of brambles, thickets, vines, and low-lying vegetation. Catharine Furnace, abandoned in the 1840s, had recently been reactivated to produce iron for the Confederate war effort. This area was largely unsuitable for the deployment of artillery and the control of large infantry formations, which would nullify some of the Union advantage in military power. It was important for Hooker's plan that his men move quickly out of this area and attack Lee in the open ground to the east. There were three primary roads available for this west-to-east movement: the Orange Plank Road, the Orange Turnpike, and the River Road.

The Confederate dispositions were as follows: the Rappahannock line at Fredericksburg was occupied by Longstreet's First Corps division of Lafayette McLaws on Marye's Heights, with Jackson's entire Second Corps to their right. Early's division was at Prospect Hill and the divisions of Rodes, Hill, and Colston extended the Confederate right flank along the river almost to Skinker's Neck. The other division present from Longstreet's Corps, Anderson's, guarded the river crossings on the left flank. Stuart's cavalry was largely in Culpeper County near Kelly's Ford, beyond the infantry's left flank.

April 27–30: Movement to battle
On April 27–28, the initial three corps of the Army of the Potomac began their march under the leadership of Slocum. They crossed the Rappahannock and Rapidan rivers as planned and began to concentrate on April 30 around the hamlet of Chancellorsville, which was little more than a single large, brick mansion at the junction of the Orange Turnpike and Orange Plank Road. Built in the early 19th century, it had been used as an inn on the turnpike for many years, but now served as a home for the Frances Chancellor family. (Some of the family remained in the house during the battle.) Hooker arrived late in the afternoon on April 30 and made the mansion his headquarters. Stoneman's cavalry began on April 30 its second attempt to reach Lee's rear areas. The two II Corps divisions crossed at U.S. Ford on April 30 without opposition. By dawn on April 29, pontoon bridges spanned the Rappahannock south of Fredericksburg and Sedgwick's force began to cross. Pleased with the success of the operation so far, and realizing that the Confederates were not vigorously opposing the river crossings, Hooker ordered Sickles to begin the movement of the III Corps from Falmouth the night of April 30 – May 1. By May 1, Hooker had approximately 70,000 men concentrated in and around Chancellorsville.

In his Fredericksburg headquarters, Lee was initially in the dark about the Union intentions and he suspected that the main column under Slocum was heading towards Gordonsville. Jeb Stuart's cavalry was cut off at first by Stoneman's departure on April 30, but they were soon able to move freely around the army's flanks on their reconnaissance missions after almost all their Union counterparts had left the area. As Stuart's intelligence information about the Union river crossings began to arrive, Lee did not react as Hooker had anticipated. He decided to violate one of the generally accepted principles of war and divide his force in the face of a superior enemy, hoping that aggressive action would allow him to attack and defeat a portion of Hooker's army before it could be fully concentrated against him. He became convinced that Sedgwick's force would demonstrate against him, but not become a serious threat, so he ordered about 4/5 of his army to meet the challenge from Chancellorsville. He left behind a brigade under Brig. Gen. William Barksdale on heavily fortified Marye's Heights behind Fredericksburg and one division under Maj. Gen. Jubal A. Early, on Prospect Hill south of the town. These roughly 11,000 men and 56 guns would attempt to resist any advance by Sedgwick's 40,000. He ordered Stonewall Jackson to march west and link up with Maj. Gen. Richard H. Anderson's division, which had pulled back from the river crossings they were guarding and began digging earthworks on a north-south line between the Zoan and Tabernacle churches. McLaws's division was ordered from Fredericksburg to join Anderson. This would amass 40,000 men to confront Hooker's movement east from Chancellorsville. Fortunately for the Confederates, heavy fog along the Rappahannock masked some of these westward movements and Sedgwick chose to wait until he could determine the enemy's intentions.

Union
The Army of the Potomac, commanded by Maj. Gen. Joseph Hooker, had 133,868 men and 413 guns organized as follows:


 * I Corps, commanded by Maj. Gen. John F. Reynolds, with the divisions of Brig. Gens. James S. Wadsworth, John C. Robinson, and Abner Doubleday.
 * II Corps, commanded by Maj. Gen. Darius N. Couch, with the divisions of Maj. Gen. Winfield Scott Hancock and William H. French, and Brig. Gen. John Gibbon.
 * III Corps, commanded by Maj. Gen. Daniel E. Sickles, with the divisions of Brig. Gen. David B. Birney, and Maj. Gens. Hiram G. Berry and Amiel W. Whipple.
 * V Corps, commanded by Maj. Gen. George G. Meade, with the divisions of Brig. Gens. Charles Griffin and Andrew A. Humphreys, and Maj. Gen. George Sykes.
 * VI Corps, commanded by Maj. Gen. John Sedgwick, with the divisions of Brig. Gens. William T. H. Brooks and Albion P. Howe, Maj. Gen. John Newton, and Col. Hiram Burnham.
 * XI Corps, commanded by Maj. Gen. Oliver O. Howard, with the divisions of Brig. Gen. Charles Devens, Jr, and Adolph von Steinwehr, and Maj. Gen. Carl Schurz.
 * XII Corps, commanded by Maj. Gen. Henry W. Slocum, with the divisions of Brig. Gens. Alpheus S. Williams and John W. Geary.
 * Cavalry Corps, commanded by Maj. Gen. George Stoneman, with the divisions of Brig. Gens. Alfred Pleasonton, William W. Averell, and David M. Gregg.

Confederate
Gen. Robert E. Lee's Army of Northern Virginia fielded 60,298 men and 220 guns, organized as follows:


 * First Corps, commanded by Lt. Gen. James Longstreet. Longstreet and the majority of his corps (the divisions of Maj. Gen. John Bell Hood and Maj. Gen. George E. Pickett, and two artillery battalions) were detached for duty in southeastern Virginia. The divisions present at Chancellorsville were those of Maj. Gens. Lafayette McLaws and Richard H. Anderson.
 * Second Corps, commanded by Lt. Gen. Stonewall Jackson, with the divisions of Maj. Gen. A.P. Hill, Brig. Gen. Robert E. Rodes, Maj. Gen. Jubal A. Early, and Brig. Gen. Raleigh E. Colston.
 * Cavalry Corps, commanded by Maj. Gen. J.E.B. Stuart. (Stuart's corps had only two brigades at Chancellorsville, those of Brig. Gens. Fitzhugh Lee and W.H.F. "Rooney" Lee. The brigades of Brig. Gens. Wade Hampton III and William E. "Grumble" Jones were detached.)

The Chancellorsville Campaign was one of the most lopsided clashes of the war, with the Union's effective fighting force more than twice the Confederates', the greatest imbalance during the war in Virginia. Hooker's army was much better supplied and was well-rested after several months of inactivity. Lee's forces, on the other hand, were poorly provisioned and were scattered all over the state of Virginia. Some 15,000 men of Longstreet's Corps had previously been detached and stationed near Norfolk in order to block a potential threat to Richmond from Federal troops stationed at Fort Monroe and Newport News on the Peninsula, as well as at Norfolk and Suffolk. In light of the continued Federal inactivity, by late March Longstreet's primary assignment became that of requisitioning provisions for Lee's forces from the farmers and planters of North Carolina and Virginia. As a result of this, the two divisions of Maj. Gen. John Bell Hood and Maj. Gen. George Pickett were 130 mi (210 km) away from Lee's army and would take a week or more of marching to reach it in an emergency. After nearly a year of campaigning, allowing these troops to slip away from his immediate control was Lee's gravest miscalculation during the campaign.

May 1: Hooker passes on opportunity
Jackson's men began marching west to join with Anderson before dawn on May 1. Jackson himself met with Anderson near Zoan Church at 8 a.m., finding that McLaws's division had already arrived to join the defensive position. But Stonewall Jackson was not in a defensive mood. He ordered an advance at 11 a.m. along two roads toward Chancellorsville: McLaws's division and the brigade of Brig. Gen. William Mahone on the Turnpike, and Anderson's other brigades and Jackson's arriving units on the Plank Road. At about the same time, Hooker ordered his men to advance on three roads to the east: two divisions of Meade's V Corps (Griffin and Humphreys) on the River Road to uncover Banks's Ford, and the remaining division (Sykes) on the Turnpike; and Slocum's XII Corps on the Plank Road, with Howard's XI Corps in close support. Couch's II Corps was placed in reserve, where it would be soon joined by Sickles's III Corps.

The first shots of the Battle of Chancellorsville were fired at 11:20 a.m. as the armies collided. McLaws's initial attack pushed back Sykes's division, but the Union general organized a counterattack that recovered the lost ground. Anderson then sent a brigade under Brig. Gen. Ambrose Wright up an unfinished railroad south of the Plank Road, around the right flank of Slocum's corps. This would normally be a serious problem, but Howard's XI Corps was advancing from the rear and could deal with Wright. Sykes's division had proceeded farther forward than Slocum on his right, leaving him in an exposed position, which forced him to conduct an orderly withdrawal at 2 p.m. to take up a position behind Hancock's division of the II Corps, which was ordered by Hooker to advance and help repulse the Confederate attack. Meade's other two divisions made good progress on the River Road and were approaching their objective, Banks's Ford.

Despite being in a potentially favorable situation, Hooker halted his brief offensive. His actions may have demonstrated his lack of confidence in handling the complex actions of such a large organization for the first time (he had been an effective and aggressive division and corps commander in previous battles), but he had also decided before beginning the campaign that he would fight the battle defensively, forcing Lee, with his small army, to attack his own, larger one. At the [First] Battle of Fredericksburg (December 13, 1862), the Union army had done the attacking and met with a bloody defeat. Hooker knew Lee could not sustain such a defeat and keep an effective army in the field, so he ordered his men to withdraw back into the Wilderness and take a defensive position around Chancellorsville, daring Lee to attack him or retreat with superior forces at his back. He confused matters by issuing a second order to his subordinates to hold their positions until 5 p.m., but by the time it was received, most of the Union units had begun their rearward movements. That evening, Hooker sent a message to his corps commanders, "The major general commanding trusts that a suspension in the attack to-day will embolden the enemy to attack him."

Hooker's subordinates were surprised and outraged by the change in plans. They saw that the position they were fighting for near the Zoan Church was relatively high ground and offered an opportunity for the infantry and artillery to deploy outside the constraints of the Wilderness. Meade exclaimed, "My God, if we can't hold the top of the hill, we certainly can't hold the bottom of it!" Viewing through the lens of hindsight, some of the participants and many modern historians judged that Hooker effectively lost the campaign on May 1. Stephen W. Sears observed, however, that Hooker's concern was based on more than personal timidity. The ground being disputed was little more than a clearing in the Wilderness, to which access was available by only two narrow roads. The Confederate response had swiftly concentrated the aggressive Stonewall Jackson's corps against his advancing columns such that the Federal army was outnumbered in that area, about 48,000 to 30,000, and would have difficulty maneuvering into effective lines of battle. Meade's two divisions on the River Road were too far separated to support Slocum and Sykes, and reinforcements from the rest of the II Corps and the III Corps would be too slow in arriving.

As the Union troops dug in around Chancellorsville that night, creating log breastworks, faced with abatis, Lee and Stonewall Jackson met at the intersection of the Plank Road and the Furnace Road to plan their next move. Jackson believed that Hooker would retreat across the Rappahannock, but Lee assumed that the Union general had invested too much in the campaign to withdraw so precipitously. If the Federal troops were still in position on May 2, Lee would attack them. As they discussed their options, cavalry commander J.E.B. Stuart arrived with an intelligence report from his subordinate, Brig. Gen. Fitzhugh Lee. Although Hooker's left flank was firmly anchored by Meade's V Corps on the Rappahannock, and his center was strongly fortified, his right flank was "in the air." Howard's XI Corps was camped on the Orange Turnpike, extending past Wilderness Church, and was vulnerable to a flanking attack. Investigations of a route to be used to reach the flank identified the proprietor of Catharine Furnace, Charles C. Wellford, who showed Jackson's cartographer, Jedediah Hotchkiss, a recently constructed road through the forest that would shield marchers from the observation of Union pickets. Lee directed Jackson to make the flanking march, a maneuver similar to the one that had been so successful prior to the Second Battle of Bull Run (Second Manassas). An account by Hotchkiss recalls that Lee asked Jackson how many men he would take on the flanking march and Jackson replied, "my whole command."

May 2: Jackson's Turnpike Charge
Early on the morning of May 2, Hooker began to realize that Lee's actions on May 1 had not been constrained by the threat of Sedgwick's force at Fredericksburg, so no further deception was needed on that front. He decided to summon the I Corps of Maj. Gen. John F. Reynolds to reinforce his lines at Chancellorsville. His intent was that Reynolds would form up to the right of the XI Corps and anchor the Union right flank on the Rapidan River. Given the communications chaos of May 1, Hooker was under the mistaken impression that Sedgwick had withdrawn back across the Rappahannock and, based on this, that the VI Corps should remain on the north bank of the river across from the town, where it could protect the army's supplies and supply line. (In fact, both Reynolds and Sedgwick were still west of the Rappahannock, south of the town.) Hooker sent his orders at 1:55 a.m., expecting that Reynolds would be able to start marching before daylight, but problems with his telegraph communications delayed the order to Fredericksburg until just before sunrise. Reynolds was forced to make a risky daylight march. By the afternoon of May 2, when Hooker expected him to be digging in on the Union right at Chancellorsville, Reynolds was still marching to the Rappahannock.

Meanwhile, for the second time, Lee was dividing his army. Jackson would lead his Second Corps of 28,000 men around to attack the Union right flank while Lee exercised personal command of the remaining two divisions, about 13,000 men and 24 guns facing the 70,000 Union troops at Chancellorsville. For the plan to work, several things had to happen. First, Jackson had to make a 12-mile (19 km) march via roundabout roads to reach the Union right, and he had to do it undetected. Second, Hooker had to stay tamely on the defensive. Third, Early would have to keep Sedgwick bottled up at Fredericksburg, despite the four-to-one Union advantage there. And when Jackson launched his attack, he had to hope that the Union forces were unprepared.

Confederate cavalry under Stuart kept most Union forces from spotting Jackson on his long flank march, which started between 7 and 8 a.m. and lasted until midafternoon. Several Confederate soldiers saw the Union observation balloon Eagle soaring overhead and assumed that they could likewise be seen, but no such report was sent to headquarters. When men of the III Corps spotted a Confederate column moving through the woods, their division commander, Brig. Gen. David B. Birney, ordered his artillery to open fire, but this proved little more than harassment. The corps commander, Sickles, rode to Hazel Grove to see for himself and he reported after the battle that his men observed the Confederates passing for over three hours.

When Hooker received the report about the Confederate movement, he thought that Lee might be starting a retreat, but he also realized that a flanking march might be in progress. He took two actions. First, he sent a message at 9:30 a.m. to the commander of the XI Corps, Maj. Gen. Oliver O. Howard on his right flank: "We have good reason to suppose the enemy is moving to our right. Please advance your pickets for purposes of observation as far as may be safe in order to obtain timely information of their approach." At 10:50 a.m., Howard replied that he was "taking measures to resist an attack from the west." Hooker's second action was to send orders to Sedgwick ("attack the enemy in his front" at Fredericksburg if "an opportunity presents itself with a reasonable expectation of success") and Sickles ("advance cautiously toward the road followed by the enemy, and harass the movement as much as possible"). Sedgwick did not take action from the discretionary orders. Sickles, however, was enthusiastic when he received the order at noon. He sent Birney's division, flanked by two battalions of Col. Hiram Berdan's U.S. sharpshooters, south from Hazel Grove with orders to pierce the column and gain possession of the road. But the action came too late. Jackson had ordered the 23rd Georgia Infantry to guard the rear of the column and they resisted the advance of Birney and Berdan at Catherine Furnace. The Georgians were driven south and made a stand at the same unfinished railroad bed used by Wright's Brigade the day before. They were overwhelmed by 5 p.m. and most were captured. Two brigades from A.P. Hill's division turned back from the flanking march and prevented any further damage to Jackson's column, which by now had left the area.

Most of Jackson's men were unaware of the small action at the rear of their column. As they marched north on Brock Road, Jackson was prepared to turn right on the Orange Plank Road, from which his men would attack the Union lines at around Wilderness Church. However, it became apparent that this direction would lead to essentially a frontal assault against Howard's line. Fitzhugh Lee met Jackson and they ascended a hill with a sweeping view of the Union position and Jackson was delighted to see that Howard's men were resting, unaware of the impending Confederate threat. Although by now it was 3 p.m., Jackson decided to march his men two miles farther and turn right on the Turnpike instead, allowing him to strike the unprotected flank directly. The attack formation consisted of two lines—the divisions of Brig. Gens. Robert E. Rodes and Raleigh E. Colston—stretching almost a mile on either side of the turnpike, separated by 200 yards, followed by a partial line with the arriving division of A.P. Hill.

Significant contributors to the impending Union disaster were the nature of the Union XI Corps and the incompetent performance of its commander, Maj. Gen. Oliver O. Howard. Howard failed to make any provision for defending against a surprise attack, even though Hooker had ordered him to do so. The Union right flank was not anchored on any natural obstacle, and the only defenses against a flank attack consisted of two cannons pointing out into the Wilderness. Also, the XI Corps was not well respected – an outfit with poor morale and no history of battlefield success. Many of its officers and enlisted men were immigrants from Germany and other parts of Central Europe, including a number of political refugees from the 1848 revolutions. The corps had been formed in the spring of 1862 by merging Brig. Gen Louis Blenker's division with Maj. Gen John C. Frémont's Mountain Department in West Virginia. After a miserable trek across Virginia in which Blenker's troops were provisioned inadequately and suffered from widespread hunger, disease, and desertion, they joined with Fremont in a campaign that resulted in them being soundly defeated by Stonewall Jackson. Fremont's army became part of Maj. Gen John Pope's Army of Virginia in the summer. Fremont had refused to serve under Pope and was replaced by Maj. Gen Franz Sigel, an inept political general who however was much beloved by his German troops. Louis Blenker fell from a horse during the Northern Virginia Campaign and suffered injuries that would claim his life later in 1863. The corps suffered heavy casualties at Second Bull Run and was left behind in Washington D.C. during the Maryland Campaign. During the Fredericksburg Campaign, it did not join the rest of the army until after the battle was over. After Hooker took command, Sigel was the ranking general behind him. The XI Corps was the smallest in the army and Sigel's requests to general-in-chief Henry Halleck to have it enlarged were refused, so he resigned his command in March 1863 and was replaced by Maj. Gen Oliver O. Howard, who was widely unpopular with the enlisted men and brought in several new generals such as Brig. Gen Francis Barlow who had a reputation of being aggressive martinets. Eight of the 27 regiments in the corps had never been in battle before, while the remaining 21 had never been on the winning side of a battle. The German soldiers suffered from widespread ethnic friction with the rest of the army although a number of the regiments in the XI Corps consisted of native-born Americans. Hooker had no major plans for the corps except for mopping up after the main battle was over, and it was placed out on the army's right flank where it was not expected to be involved in any fighting, and the woods to the west were assumed to be so thick that enemy troops could not possibly move through them and form a line of battle. As far as Hooker knew, the only possible route for a Confederate attack was along the turnpike, which would cause them to run right into the II and XII Corps, both elite outfits and well-entrenched. Further north, the Union line was held by the V Corps, also first-rate troops occupying an almost impregnable position.

As the day wore on, the men of the XI Corps became increasingly aware that something was going on in the woods to the west of them, but were unable to get any higher-ups to pay attention. Col. John C. Lee of the 55th Ohio Infantry received numerous reports of a Confederate presence out there, and Col. William Richardson of the 25th Ohio Infantry reported that huge numbers of Confederates were massing to the west. Col. Leopold von Gilsa, who commanded one of two brigades in Brig. Gen Charles Devens' division, went to Howard's headquarters warning him that an all-out enemy assault was imminent, but Howard insisted that it was impossible for the Confederates to get through the dense woods. Maj. Gen Carl Schurz, who commanded the 3rd Division of the corps, began rearranging his troops into a line of battle. Captain Hubert Dilger, who commanded Battery I of the 1st Ohio Artillery, rode out on a reconnaissance mission, narrowly missed being captured by the Confederates, and rode far north, almost to the banks of the Rapidan, and back south to Hooker's headquarters, but a haughty cavalry officer dismissed his concerns and would not let him in to see the general. Dilger next went to Howard's headquarters but was merely told that the Confederate army was retreating and that it was not acceptable to making scouting expeditions without permission of higher-ups. As the sun started to go down, all remained quiet on the XI Corps's front, the noises of the III and XII Corps engaging Lee's rearguard coming from off in the distance.

Around 5:30 p.m., Jackson turned to Robert Rodes and asked him "General, are you ready?" When Rodes nodded, Jackson replied, "You may go forward then." Most of the men of the XI Corps were encamped and sitting down for supper and had their rifles unloaded and stacked. Their first clue to the impending onslaught was the observation of numerous animals, such as rabbits and foxes, fleeing in their direction out of the western woods. This was followed by the crackle of musket fire, and then the unmistakable scream of the "Rebel Yell". Two of von Gilsa's regiments, the 153rd Pennsylvania and 54th New York, had been placed up as a heavy skirmish line and the massive Confederate assault rolled completely over them. A few men managed to get off a shot or two before fleeing. The pair of artillery pieces at the very end of the XI Corps line were captured by the Confederates and promptly turned on their former owners. Devens's division collapsed in a matter of minutes, slammed on three sides by almost 30,000 Confederates. Col. Robert Reily and his 75th Ohio managed to resist for about ten minutes before the regiment disintegrated with 150 casualties, including Reily himself, and joined the rest of the fleeing mob. Col. Lee would later write sarcastically, "A rifle pit is useless when the enemy is on the same side and in the rear of your line." Some men tried to stand and resist, but they were knocked over by their fleeing comrades and a hail of Confederate bullets. Maj. Gen. Carl Schurz ordered his division to shift from an east-west alignment to north-south, which they did with amazing precision and speed. They resisted for about 20 minutes and "Leatherbreeches" Dilger managed to drive the Confederates off the turnpike for a bit with his guns, but the sheer weight of Jackson's assault overwhelmed them too and they soon had to flee. Dilger for a time stood alone with a gun firing double-shotted canister at the attackers, then limbered up to flee as the Confederates closed in on him. Three of his artillery horses were shot dead, and when he realized that the gun could not be moved, he had to abandon it. General Howard partially redeemed his inadequate performance prior to the battle by his personal bravery in attempting to rally the troops. He stood shouting and waving a flag held under the stump of his amputated arm (lost at the Battle of Seven Pines in 1862), ignoring the danger of the heavy rifle fire, but he could only gather small pockets of soldiers to resist before his corps disintegrated. Col. Adolf Buschbeck's brigade put up a last-ditch stand along with Dilger's guns. They too had to retreat but maintained good order as they went.

The chaos unfurling on the Union right had gone unnoticed at Hooker's headquarters until at last the sound of gunfire could be heard in the distance, followed by a panic-stricken mob of men and horses pouring into the Chancellorsville clearing. A staff officer yelled "My God, here they come!" as the mob ran to and past the Chancellor mansion. Hooker jumped onto his horse and frantically tried to take action. He ordered Maj. Gen Hiram Berry's division of the III Corps, once his own division, forward, yelling "Receive them on your bayonets!" Artillerymen around the clearing began moving guns into position around Fairview Cemetery. Meanwhile, down at Hazel Grove, the 8th Pennsylvania Cavalry were relaxing and awaiting orders to chase after Confederate wagon trains, also oblivious to the collapse of the XI Corps. The regiment's commander, Maj. Pennock Huey, received a notice that General Howard was requesting some cavalry. Huey saddled up his men and headed west along the turnpike, where they ran straight into Robert Rodes's division. After a confused fight, the 8th Pennsylvania Cavalry retreated to the safety of the Chancellorsville clearing with the loss of 30 men and three officers.

Around 9:00 p.m., the Confederate Second Corps had advanced more than 1.25 miles, to within sight of Chancellorsville, but darkness and confusion were taking their toll. The attackers were almost as disorganized as the routed defenders. Although the XI Corps had been defeated, it had retained some coherence as a unit. The corps suffered nearly 2,500 casualties (259 killed, 1,173 wounded, and 994 missing or captured), about one-quarter of its strength, including 12 of 23 regimental commanders, which suggests that they fought fiercely during their retreat. Jackson wanted to press his advantage before Hooker and his army could regain their bearings and plan a counterattack, which might still succeed because of the sheer disparity in numbers. He rode out onto the Plank Road that night to determine the feasibility of a night attack by the light of the full moon, traveling beyond the farthest advance of his men. When one of his staff officers warned him about the dangerous position, Jackson replied, "The danger is all over. The enemy is routed. Go back and tell A.P. Hill to press right on." As he and his staff started to return, they were incorrectly identified as Union cavalry by men of the 18th North Carolina Infantry, who fired on Jackson's staff. Though several staff members were killed in the volley, Jackson himself was unharmed and soon rallied his men to continue their push to the Rappahannock. Historians have often considered this incident a watershed moment in the battle, as Jackson himself would late muse on his luck at surviving such an incident.

Around 10 p.m., Lee learned of Jackson's intentions to take the U.S. Ford, thus depriving Hooker's of his only means of retreat, the Confederate general quickly mobilized his men and began an assault upon Sickles' Corps on Hazel Grove, now the only force separating Lee and Jackson's men, which had been separated from the main body of the army after its foray attacking Jackson's column earlier in the afternoon.

Like everyone else in the Union army, the III Corps had been unaware of Jackson's attack. When he first heard the news, Sickles was skeptical, but finally believed it and had decided to pull back to Hazel Grove. Sickles became increasingly nervous, knowing that his troops were facing an unknown number of Confederates to the west and with scouts reporting that Lee's forces were mobilizing to trap him in a pincer move. Though Sickles' attempted a valiant stand against the two forces of Lee's army, even attempting to lead a charge against Jackson's men that was only thwarted by friendly artillery fire, he would be ordered to withdraw by a panicked Hooker around midnight, ceding the last remaining piece of high ground to the Confederates.

Jackson's men collided with Reynolds' I Corps, still crossing the Rappahannock, around the same time. Tired after a long daytime march and caught off guard, Reynolds' men stood little chance against the Confederates, quickly falling back across the U.S. Ford.

May 3: Chancellorsville
By the time the Confederate advance halted and fighting ceased, around 1:30 a.m., the III, XII, II, V, and remnants of the XI Corps, around 76,000 Union men, had found themselves completely surrounded, though the fighting was not yet finished. Though Howard's XI Corps had been defeated, Reynolds's I Corps had begun to arrive overnight to replace Howard's losses before they had been intercepted and divided while crossing the U.S. Ford, with James Wadworth's division managing to make the trip across before the interception. The retreat of Sickles's III Corps, had also allowed the soldiers of the two halves of Lee's army to reunite shortly after 1:00 a.m. before the Chancellor mansion, wildly triumphant as Lee arrived on Traveller, his favorite horse, to survey the scene of his victory.

The merger of the Confederate army put them in a strong position to assault the formidable Union earthworks around Chancellorsville and further pressure the Union forces into surrender. Hazel Grove and the neighboring Fairview Hill were soon turned into powerful artillery platforms with 50 guns (some captured Federal artillery) under Col. Porter Alexander.

The Confederate attack on May 3 began again around 5:30 a.m.. In preparation for the assault, Jackson had organized his divisions to best secure his three objectives: Hill's division was to secure and ensure that the U.S. Ford remained out of Union hands, Colston was to stand his ground and keep the Union trapped against the Rappahannock, and Rodes's, whose men had done the hardest fighting on May 2, were to stand in reserve. While Colston and Rodes stood as an anvil, Lee, supported by the newly installed artillery at Hazel Grove, would launch an attack from the south to smash against Union fortifications. The Confederates along the southernmost part of the front were resisted fiercely by the Union troops behind strong earthworks, and the fighting on May 3 was the heaviest of the campaign. However, the severe bombardment by Confederate artillery, coupled with a severe breakdown in Union command, forced the Union Army to slowly give ground.

At the height of the fighting on May 3, Hooker was killed when, at 9:10 a.m., the general was struck by a Confederate cannonball. Upon Hooker's death, command transferred to his second-in-command, Maj. Gen. Darius N. Couch, and, with Hooker's chief of staff, Maj. Gen. Daniel Butterfield, and Sedgwick out of communication (again due to the failure of the telegraph lines), the Union position was further weakened as confusion and a drop in troop morale set in throughout the line.

By the end of the day, the Union had suffered massive casualties and word had begun to reach both sides that Confederate Lt. Gen. James Longstreet was lifting his siege at Suffolk to march north and help reinforce Lee's army.

May 3: Battle of the U.S. Ford
During Jackson's "Turnpike Charge" on May 2, A.P. Hill's division had held the rear and thus seen the least of the fighting, leaving many of the men stronger than their counterparts in Jackson's other two divisions. This lack of fatigue was crucial for Hill's objective at the U.S. Ford, as his division would be going up against the entirety of Maj. Gen. John Reynolds I Corps, which had seen almost no fighting the entire campaign. If Hill could not prevent the I Corps from crossing the Ford and reinforcing the main Union force at Chancellorsville, then Lee and Jackson's plan to force a surrender would fail. Though the battle seemed extremely one-sided towards the Union, Hill possessed two advantages that would help to turn the tide in the battle, the terrain and the weather.

The weeks and days leading up to the battle had seen a great deal of rainfall throughout Northern Virginia. This rain had swelled the Rappahannock, making the crossing in places like the U.S. Ford extremely treacherous. In addition, Hill had placed his men on a steep incline overlooking the river, protected by trees and incredibly difficult for the Union forces to assail.

In order to cross the ford, Reynolds had to employ the use of pontoon bridges which bottlenecked his forces and made them easier targets for Hill's men. With the addition of some artillery firing across the river, Reynolds men would spend the entirety of the day trying to establish a foothold on the southside of the river. The closest they would come would be at 4:00 p.m., when some men of Maj. Gen. Abner Doubleday managed to make their way onto the shoreline and charge up the hill, doing battle with Brig. Gen. Henry Heth's division, which had occupied the center. Though the fighting was fierce and some feared that the center might fall, the Confederates managed to hold their ground and drive the Union forces back against the river.

By the time the fighting ended at dusk, the men of the I Corps were suffering from incredibly low morale and the news from Fredericksburg of James Longstreet's march north to reinforce the rebels, only aided in the general malaise of the Army.

May 3-4: Fredericksburg and Salem Church


As Lee was capitalizing on his victory at the Chancellorsville crossroads, he received disturbing news: Maj. Gen. John Sedgwick's force had broken through the Confederate lines at Fredericksburg and was headed toward Chancellorsville. On the night of May 2, in the aftermath of Jackson's attack, Hooker had ordered Sedgwick to "cross the Rappahannock at Fredericksburg on the receipt of this order, and at once take up your line of march on the Chancellorsville road until you connect with him. You will attack and destroy any force you may fall in with on the road." Lee had left a relatively small force at Fredericksburg, ordering Brig. Gen. Jubal Early to "watch the enemy and try to hold him." If he was attacked in "overwhelming numbers," Early was to retreat to Richmond, but if Sedgwick withdrew from his front, he was to join with Lee at Chancellorsville. On the morning of May 2, Early received a garbled message from Lee's staff that caused him to start marching most of his men toward Chancellorsville, but he quickly returned after a warning from Brig. Gen. William Barksdale of a Union advance against Fredericksburg. At 7 a.m. on May 3, Early was confronted with four Union divisions: Brig. Gen. John Gibbon of the II Corps had crossed the Rappahannock north of town, and three divisions of Sedgwick's VI Corps—Maj. Gen. John Newton and Brig. Gens. Albion P. Howe and William T. H. Brooks—were arrayed in line from the front of the town to Deep Run. Most of Early's combat strength was deployed to the south of town, where Federal troops had achieved their most significant successes during the December battle. Marye's Heights was defended by Barksdale's Mississippi brigade and Early ordered the Louisiana brigade of Brig. Gen. Harry T. Hays from the far right to Barksdale's left.

By mid-morning, two Union attacks against the infamous stone wall on Marye's Heights were repulsed with numerous casualties. A Union party under flag of truce was allowed to approach ostensibly to collect the wounded, but while close to the stone wall, they were able to observe how sparsely the Confederate line was manned. A third Union attack was successful in overrunning the Confederate position. Early was able to organize an effective fighting retreat. John Sedgwick's road to Chancellorsville was open, but he wasted time in gathering his troops and forming a marching column. His men, led by Brooks's division, followed by Newton and Howe, were delayed for several hours by successive actions against the Alabama brigade of Brig. Gen. Cadmus M. Wilcox. His final delaying line was a ridge at Salem church, where he was joined by three brigades from McLaws's division and one from Anderson's, bringing the total Confederate strength to about 10,000 men.

Artillery fire was exchanged by both sides in the afternoon and at 5:30 p.m., two brigades of Brooks's division attacked both sides of the Plank Road. The advance south of the road reached as far as the churchyard but was driven back. The attack north of the road could not break the Confederate line. Wilcox described the action as "a bloody repulse to the enemy, rendering entirely useless to him his little success of the morning at Fredericksburg."

The fighting on May 3, 1863, was some of the most furious anywhere in the civil war. The loss of 24,257 men that day in the four battles, divided equally between the two armies, would surpass the Battle of Antietam as the bloodiest day of war in American history.

May 4: Withdrawal of Sedgwick and Reynolds
On May 4, Couch, realizing that efforts to break through or free the main Union army had been stopped at both the U.S. Ford and Fredericksburg and that further fighting would simply result in needless casualties by artillery fire, ordered Reynolds and Sedgwick to withdraw from the battle whilst he began the process of surrendering. Historians have long questioned why the normally aggressive Couch would take such an action, with most agreeing that his intentions were made with long-term war plans in mind. A surrender might've distracted Confederate forces long enough for the Union army to regroup and re-mobilize to defend against another invasion of the North. With the added fear of Gen. Longstreet arriving to cut off any Union retreat, allowing part of his army to surrender while a portion retreated may have seemed the wisest course of action.

Regardless of the reasons and objections made by his subordinates, Couch sent the order out for Sedgwick and Reynolds to withdraw. Reynolds, who was already on the northern half of the Rappahannock, had a simple job of withdrawing from the field, allowing Hill's division to redeploy and supplement the northern Confederate line, though not before destroying the last of the pontoon bridges.

Though in a more defensible position than his I Corps counterpart, Sedgwick had received little guidance from Couch and was thus stuck in a purely defensive position throughout the day on May 4 as he prepared his withdraw, finally managing to cross the Rappahannock at Banks's Ford during the pre-dawn hours of May 5.

May 5: Surrender at Wilderness Church
When he learned that Sedgwick had successfully retreated back over the river, Couch sent a message to Lee. After several hours of correspondence between Couch and Lee, a cease-fire was enacted and Lee received Couch's request to discuss surrender terms.

The surrender talks were long and drawn out, though perhaps this was in Couch's favor. Regardless, the terms of surrender were very much to be expected. Officers and observers were to be escorted to Richmond to sit out the remainder of the war, while the various divisions and brigades would be split up and scattered across Confederate prison camps following the removal of their arms. Given the sheer size of the surrendered force, few considerations for rations could be given.

The Union cavalry under Brig. Gen. George Stoneman, after a week of ineffectual raiding in central and southern Virginia in which they failed to attack any of the objectives Hooker had established, withdrew into Union lines east of Richmond—the peninsula north of the York River, across from Yorktown—on May 7, officially ending the campaign.

When Longstreet converged with Lee's on May 10, they began the slow process of transferring surrendered men to Richmond for processing before sending them out to other prison camps, a process that would take the rest of the month to complete and give the Union I and VI Corps plenty of time to link up at Warrentown.

Casualties
Lee, despite being outnumbered by a ratio of over two to one, won his greatest victory of the war, sometimes described as his "perfect battle." Despite this, Lee took more casualties than he had lost in any previous battle, including the Confederate defeat at the Battle of Antietam. With only 60,000 men engaged, he suffered 15,405 casualties (2,667 killed, 10,111 wounded, 2,188 missing), losing more than 25% of his force in the campaign—men that the Confederacy, with its limited manpower, could not replace. After Longstreet rejoined the main army on May 10, he was highly critical of Lee's strategy, saying that battles like Chancellorsville cost the Confederacy more men than it could afford to lose. It is largely held that it was the severe loss at Chancellorsville, despite the immense victory, that impacted and influenced Lee's strategies in the Baltimore Campaign, ultimately leading to a Confederate victory in the war.

Though the losses on the Confederate side were significant, Union losses crippled their entire capacity to fight in the Eastern Theatre. Of the 133,000 Union men engaged, there 17,626 casualties (2,456 killed, 10,665 wounded, 4,505 missing) and 59,831 surrendered Union soldiers.

Assessment of Hooker and Couch
Hooker, who began the campaign believing he had "80 chances in 100 to be successful", lost the battle through miscommunication, the incompetence of some of his leading generals (most notably Howard and Stoneman, but also Sedgwick), but mostly through the collapse of his own confidence. His inability to take the initiative on the first and second days, followed by his death of third, left Gen. Couch in an impossible position. The Union Army was cut off, with more than half of the army surrounded and low on supplies due to mismanagement.

In the immediate years following the war, historians were very critical of Couch's decision to surrender the Union Army on the 5th. Modern historians however have been more understanding of Couch's reasoning. The surrender of such a large force tied up Confederate resources in the Eastern Theatre for nearly a month. All of this time gave the remaining Union Army time to resupply and reinforce and might have even allowed the Union Army to come back from such a defeat, had the political situation in the Union not disintegrated following the battle.

Union reaction
The Union was almost crippled by the defeat. President Abraham Lincoln was quoted as saying, "My God! My God! What will the country say?". The death of Hooker and the loss of so many career generals as POWs made finding a replacement commander of the remaining army difficult, especially given the friction between Lincoln, general in chief Henry W. Halleck, and other politically appointed generals.

Public opinion slowly began to turn against the war, especially among Democrats and immigrants in the East and Midwest. Following the Statehouse Massacre, the few Democrat supporters of the Lincoln administration turned against the President and began to call for a negotiated peace. With the fall of Baltimore and the death of Lincoln during the Baltimore Campaign, as well as the recognition of the Confederate States by the United Kingdom, France, and Second Mexican Empire roughly six months after the battle, most historians consider Chancellorsville to be the point where the Confederacy won the war.

Confederate reaction
The victory at Chancellorsville became a legendary moment in Confederate history, on par with the Siege of Yorktown or Battle of Trafalgar. Lee and Jackson attained almost divine status in social circles due to their efforts during the battle.

Chancellorsville did much to restore the fighting spirit and morale of the Confederacy, especially given the recent hardships as a result of Grant's campaign out east and the Union's Anaconda Plan. The victory also began to turn international opinions towards the Confederate States, which would ultimately lead to a Southern victory.