Civil War Battlefields
The Civil War had entered its third year, and the Army of the Potomac was again on the march. Led by its new commander, “Fighting Joe” Hooker, the 134,000 man juggernaut crossed the Rappahannock River beyond Lee’s left flank on April 23 1863 and descended on a former country inn known as Chancellorsville. Although reduced to just 60,000 men, Lee responded with his custom audacity, attacking Hooker here in the gloomy thickets of the Wilderness.
Four days of pitched battle followed, in which Lee outmanoeuvred and outfought his opponent, ultimately forcing him to retreat. It was the Southern leader’s greatest triumph in the war, but it came at great cost. On May 10 1863 his top general, Thomas J “Stonewall” Jackson, dies of wounds received in battle (from his own men). Without Jackson to carry out his plans, Lee never again achieved such stunning success.
The intersection near the cannon was the focal point of the Chancellorsville battlefield.
“Our movements up to to the arrival at Chancellorsville were very successful and were well planned. After that everything went wrong and fighting Joe sunk into a poor driveling cur.” Union Major General Henry Slocum.
On the morning of May 3 1863 more than 17,500 men were killed or wounded in the woods and fields around Chancellorsville.
Major William H Stewart of the 61st Virginia Infantry recalled the horror and confusion of the morning, “The Chancellor House was enveloped in flames… Men everywhere were seen to be in the agonies of death, some of these grappling the earth to draw their broken forms from the range of the searching flames… On both sides of the road were scattered loaves of bread, empty haversacks and cartridge boxes… hundreds of knapsacks… thousands of muskets.“
