Daily Yellowstone Journal

WHAT SAVED HOOKER

Now in Twenty-Two Gun Battery Filled the Gap at Chancellorsville.

M. Quad in Detroit Free Press.

The movement of Jackson across Hooker's flank at Chancellorsville and around to his rear was a complete surprise. By 6 o'clock in the evening his lines of battle were formed and the order to advance was given. Scouts had reported the Eleventh corps in his front, and the attack was as swift and disastrous as a whirlwind. Most of the Federals in the Eleventh were preparing, supping or eating. If there were any pickets in rear of the Federal army they were picked up so suddenly that no general alarm was given. All of a sudden the mighty tread of battle-line and the crash of musketry fell upon the ears of the unsuspecting Federals, and the panic which ensued was but the natural finale. A few men got into line here and there, but the resistance melted away as the line advanced. It was a furious fire which Jackson's men poured into the Eleventh. They were elated and enthusiastic. And they swarmed through the pine forest as if their numbers were endless.

Men have said that the panic would have extended no farther, and that the corps would have speedily recovered from the surprise, and men have written that but for one man's coolness at the critical moment Jackson would have driven a wedge into the Federal army. Gen. Pleasanton, then commanding three regiments of cavalry and a field battery, lay in position to be run over by the frightened fugitives as they sought a place of safety. In the midst of the most embarrassing confusion he sent a regiment of dismounted cavalry forward to form a line and check the Confederates, and the other regiments, mounted, at once charged into the mass of fugitives and drove them clear off the field on the left of the plank road. Then, one by one, twenty-two guns were brought to the front and unlimbered. The spot where each gun stood was plain to view in 1894, and may be for several years to come. It was in the cleared field to the left of the Chancellorsville plank road, and about half a mile below the famous brick house. The guns enfiladed Jackson's whole front, and the moment his lines broke cover they were met with such storms of canister that whole regiments lay down after the first volley. For the first quarter of an hour these guns were supported by cavalry alone, but as regiment after regiment was picked up, whirled about, and sent to the gap, the support soon became a division. Other batteries were rushed down the plank or across the fields, and by and by Jackson's golden moment had passed. The Federal army had faced to the rear, and the great gap had been closed by artillery.

Just at sundown Jackson grew restive under the terrific fire, and ordered a general advance. Long lines of men sprang to their feet and rushed forward with cheers and yells, determined to have the guns. It did not seem as if anything living could cross that open space of 600 feet with such a tornado of canister sweeping over it, but whole regiments charged up to within fifty feet, and scores of Confederates dashed in among guns and were killed there. The charge was repulsed, but to be made again and again. When night had settled down Jackson gave it up. He could not drive his wedge past the muzzle of Pleasanton's guns. He had hoodwinked Hooker, routed a whole corps, and laid his plans for a great victory. That storm of canister checked him-death brought his plans to naught.

The Confederates who advanced against these guns defied death ten thousand times over. Those who were killed were in most instances riddled and torn to pieces. The burial parties found corpses with fifty wounds, and heads, legs and arms were scattered all along the front. Not one single wounded man was found on that battery front. On the right flank, where the guns had an enfilade on the plank road, the rail fences were torn into splinters, the ground cut as by a hundred drags, and scores of Confederates lying in the highway ditches were wounded by stones, splinters and fragments of rocks.