[Doug64]

In many ways, the American Civil War was the birth of modern industrial warfare, just as the American Revolution had been the birth of modern democratic politics. And like any birth, it was accompanied by blood and terrible pain. The birth pangs of modernity.

The first battles between ironclads, repeating rifles, the use of railroads for both moving and supplying troops (the dictum up through the Napoleonic era had been that a small army loses while a large army starves), the use (and abuse) of the telegraph for managing strategic maneuvering of armies, the proto-trench warfare of the siege of Petersburg ... there were a lot of lessons Europe could have carried into World War I, if they hadn’t pretty much dismissed the war as a series of collisions of massive mobs.

[Potemkin]

The first battles between ironclads, repeating rifles, the use of railroads for both moving and supplying troops (the dictum up through the Napoleonic era had been that a small army loses while a large army starves), the use (and abuse) of the telegraph for managing strategic maneuvering of armies, the proto-trench warfare of the siege of Petersburg ... there were a lot of lessons Europe could have carried into World War I, if they hadn’t pretty much dismissed the war as a series of collisions of massive mobs.

European snobbery against the "democratic rabble" of the USA. That same dismissive snobbery still existed as late as the Second World War, and is probably what prompted the aristocratic Field-Marshal Montgomery to publicly dismiss his American colleagues as "a bunch of bloody amateurs", a judgment which was way off the mark. The European refusal to analyse the American Civil War was to cost them dearly half a century later.

[Doug64]

March 10, Monday

At daylight, endless columns of Federal troops cross the Potomac and join others streaming out of camps on the Virginia side of the river, headed for Centreville and Manassas in the wake of the retreating Confederates.

After all the excitement of the last few days it is a quiet time on the battle fronts, though the press is full of Pea Ridge, Arkansas, the battle of Monitor and Virginia, the advance and withdrawal in northern Virginia, and the build-up of Federals on the Tennessee River at Savannah and Pittsburg Landing. Citizens are studying maps, usually without such places yet on them.

Only a brief skirmish in La Fayette County, Missouri, is recorded for the day.

In Washington President Lincoln writes that “General McClellan is after him,” but, of course, all the Army of the Potomac is doing is getting exercise before returning to its camps. Lincoln and Washington remain keyed up over the Monitor-Virginia fight and the President pays a visit to Lieutenant Worden, commander of the Monitor, who suffered an eye injury in the melee. Congress discusses various aspects of slavery.

[Doug64]

March 11, Tuesday

To cap McClellan’s distressing week, President Lincoln in his War Order No. 3 officially relieves him from his post as General-in-Chief of the Federal Armies. Lincoln justifies the demotion on the ground that McClellan, “having personally taken the field” with the Army of the Potomac, cannot devote the necessary attention to other battle fronts. That is true, but it is also true that the decision would not have been made without the maneuvering of Stanton and the Radicals, who are determined to show McClellan that the Secretary of War is his superior. In any event, the commanders of all the Federal armies are ordered to report henceforth to the Secretary of War.

In the West the departments are consolidated when Major General Henry W. Halleck is given command of not only the Department of Missouri, but that of Kansas and part of the Department of the Ohio. These become the Department of the Mississippi. A new department in the mountains of Virginia and western Virginia to be termed the Mountain Department is created under the command of Major General Frémont, still in the Army despite the controversies over his Missouri reign. All generals are to report directly to the Secretary of War. There is to be no General-in-Chief, at least for a while. In Washington most Cabinet members and many other officials applaud Lincoln’s command changes, although some are bitter over the downgrading of McClellan.

The Army of the Potomac reaches Centreville and Manassas to find there are no Confederates to fight, just abandoned entrenchments, smoldering supplies, and a few Quaker guns, logs left as props to confuse the Federals and retard their advance. Newspaper reporters who accompany the march point out with some relish that the empty enemy camps could have accommodated no more than half of the 150,000 Confederates McClellan had thought entrenched here. An advance beyond Manassas seems to be out of the question. In their retreat to the south side of the Rappahannock, the Confederates have burned a dozen or more bridges behind them. And the streams are so swollen and the roads so muddy that a large body of Federal cavalry sent to challenge the Confederate rear guard have to turn back exhausted before getting much more than halfway to the Rappahannock.

After a forced march from Denver the Federal 1st Colorado Volunteers under Colonel John Slough—a prominent Denver attorney—reachEs Fort Union, New Mexico Territory. The 1st Colorado is a rough, brawling outfit composed largely of miners, frontiersmen, and the denizens of Denver’s saloons. Bored by inaction in their Colorado camps, the troops were spoiling for any kind of a fight. Their swift march south across the high plains and over the Raton Mountains in freezing weather has put the hardiest of them to the test. While still trudging through southern Colorado, they learned of the Federal defeat at Valverde and increased their pace, making 40 miles a day, sometimes through several inches of snow. They moved even faster after March 8 when they got word that General H.H. Sibley has occupied Albuquerque and is starting an advance on Fort Union. Carrying only their blankets and arms, the Coloradans marched 30 miles during the night, battling bitterly cold winds that whipped them with hurricane force. Now they finally tramp into the fort with drums beating and colors flying. Only a few had ridden; most of the 900 men have walked more than 400 miles in 13 days. Over the objections of the fort’s commander, Colonel Slough claims seniority and assumes charge of the post and all its men. Slough, ignoring Colonel Canby’s orders to defend Fort Union, begins making plans to strip the garrison and march against the Confederates.

In North Carolina, General Burnside, with about 11,000 troops, sails from Roanoke Island to rendezvous near Hatteras Inlet with 13 war vessels of the Federal fleet. This evening Burnside informs his men that they are about to embark on a great offensive in support of General McClellan’s forthcoming invasion of the Peninsula and drive on the Confederate capital. The target is New Berne.

There is a skirmish near Paris, Tennessee.

In the Shenandoah at Stephenson’s Depot north of Winchester, Virginia, there is another brief fight. However, the main action in that important area is the withdrawal of Stonewall Jackson and his 4,600 men from Winchester. Jackson anticipates that Banks will rush through the town in hot pursuit, and he plans to turn and strike the Federals in a rare night attack. But in a conference that evening with his commanders, he discovers that his troops have been allowed to march too far away from Winchester to make the attack. Still blazing with wrath as he rides out of Winchester, Jackson turns to an aide and says savagely, “That is the last council of war I will ever hold.” He will keep his word. He would have been disappointed in any event, as Banks won’t move into Winchester until tomorrow.

In Richmond President Davis refuses to accept the reports of Brigadier Generals Floyd and Pillow, who had fled Fort Donelson before the surrender. Both officers are relieved from command.

[Potemkin]

March 11, Tuesday
In Richmond President Davis refuses to accept the reports of Brigadier Generals Floyd and Pillow, who had fled Fort Donelson before the surrender. Both officers are relieved from command.

Quite right too.

[JohnRawls]

@Doug64

Pretty good. Keep up the good work.

Is this a text version of Indy Nidell? Do you like his work on WW1, between two wars or ongoing WW2?

May be perhaps you will consider adding the issues before the civil war happened which were unfolding for quite some time. Like the South bailing out the North at some point.

[Doug64]

Quite right too.

Amen! Unfortunately for Grant, he wouldn’t get the chance to face Pillow again.

@Doug64

Pretty good. Keep up the good work.

Thanks much.

Is this a text version of Indy Nidell? Do you like his work on WW1, between two wars or ongoing WW2?

I’ve never heard of Indy Nidell, so no, this isn’t taken from anything by him and I haven’t heard anything he’s had to say about the long war in the first half of the last century.

May be perhaps you will consider adding the issues before the civil war happened which were unfolding for quite some time. Like the South bailing out the North at some point.

Unlikely. I couldn’t do it in a day-day-day format like this one, and this project is already consuming more of my time than I expected. And we’re just getting to the point where things get busy. There’s going to be some huge posts coming up.

[JohnRawls]

Amen! Unfortunately for Grant, he wouldn’t get the chance to face Pillow again.


Thanks much.

I’ve never heard of Indy Nidell, so no, this isn’t taken from anything by him and I haven’t heard anything he’s had to say about the long war in the first half of the last century.

Unlikely. I couldn’t do it in a day-day-day format like this one, and this project is already consuming more of my time than I expected. And we’re just getting to the point where things get busy. There’s going to be some huge posts coming up.

You should check him out. He has been doing something similar just in youtube format. Might give you some inspiration to try something similar. He does Week By Week. Each week is around a 10-20 minute episode.

Here you go(1914 till 1919): https://www.youtube.com/user/TheGreatWar/playlists

Here you can check between two wars and WW2: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCLfMmO ... /playlists

[Doug64]

You should check him out. He has been doing something similar just in youtube format. Might give you some inspiration to try something similar. He does Week By Week. Each week is around a 10-20 minute episode.

Here you go(1914 till 1919): https://www.youtube.com/user/TheGreatWar/playlists

Here you can check between two wars and WW2: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCLfMmO ... /playlists

Thanks for the links, I’ll take a look when I have some spare time.

[Doug64]

March 12, Wednesday

In the morning General Banks’s Federal soldiers march into Winchester, Virginia, only to find Stonewall Jackson’s infantry departed yesterday. When other Federal officers express disappointment that Jackson has been permitted to get away without a fight, Colonel George Gordon predicts that “this chieftain would be apt, before the war closed, to give us an entertainment up to the utmost of our aspirations.” While Jackson withdraws at a leisurely rate to Mount Jackson, some 42 miles south along the Shenandoah Valley, Banks will only push 18 miles past Winchester to Strasburg; there he will station 9,000 men under Brigadier General James Shield, a native of Ireland’s County Tyrone and, like Banks, a highly successful politician, having served as US Senator from both Illinois and Minnesota. Besides serving in the Mexican War, he has the distinction of having once challenged Abraham Lincoln to a duel over a seemingly slanderous political article. The duel never came off.

Elsewhere, Federal naval forces under Lieutenant T.H. Stevens temporarily occupy Jacksonville, Florida.

There is a skirmish near Aubrey, Kansas.

A combined Federal army-navy expedition sails from Roanoke Island, North Carolina, to near the mouth of the Neuse River below New Berne.

President Davis writes General Albert Sidney Johnston, “We have suffered great anxiety because of recent events in Kentucky and Tennessee.” The President is concerned about the adverse public reaction and blame that is being heaped on Johnston. However, Davis adds, “I suppose the Tenn. or Mississippi river will be the object of the enemy’s next campaign, and I trust you will be able to concentrate a force which will defeat either attempt.”

[Pants-of-dog]

In 1808, America banned the import of slaves from Africa and the West Indies. The impact on actual slavery in America was almost non-existent. There was still some limited smuggling of slaves but the majority of new slaves in America came from what Professor Eric Foner called, “natural increase.” One could reasonably ask, “Why ban slave imports and not slavery itself?” The answer is because, for many of the proponents of the prohibition including Thomas Jefferson, the reason was not based on humanitarian concerns but on economics. The South was producing and selling enough slaves internally that the slave trade was reducing prices for slaves and cutting into profits.

In 1819, another act was passed allowing US ships to not only patrol its own shores but the coast of Africa in an attempt to stop slave ships at the source. Not for concerns about ending slavery but in protectionism for American slave owners. Everything was contingent on the fact that there was a “self-sustaining” population of about four million slaves in America at the time. Southern legislators joined with northern ones in passing both the acts that banned the external slave trading but ignored slavery.

Most of us are aware that slave owners often bred their slaves to produce more workers. We are taught almost nothing about the breeding farms whose function was to produce as many slaves as possible for the sale and distribution throughout the South to meet their needs. Two of the largest breeding farms were located in Richmond, VA, and the Maryland Eastern-Shore.

As far as cities I’ve never lived in, I’ve spent as much time in Richmond, VA as anywhere. I traveled there multiple times a year, often for a few days or a week at a time. Richmond is serious about most of its history. I’ve visited the Edgar Allen Poe Museum. Monument Avenue contains several statues mostly of Confederate Civil War heroes; Stonewall Jackson, Jefferson Davis, J.E.B. Stuart and Robert E. Lee are honored there as is the late African-American tennis star Arthur Ashe who was from Richmond. In August 2017, Richmond Mayor Levar Stoney said Richmond would consider the “potential removal” of the statues glorifying the legacy of the South after issues raised in nearby conflicts and protests involving white supremacists. One major part of Richmond’s history is barely remembered, hardly spoken of and taught publicly nowhere.

Richmond is a port city and exported between 10,000 to 20,000 slaves a month to states further south and west. Slavery, not tobacco was Virginia’s primary domestic crop. You may have seen scenes of slaves being offloaded in New Orleans for example. They were more likely to have come from Richmond around Florida than from Africa.

You never hear the names of the industry leaders, Robert Lumpkin ran his “jail” which was a compound surrounded by a 12-foot fence with iron spikes. Should a slave escape, by law, The Fugitive Slave Act guaranteed they would be returned courtesy of the Federal government. The slave population of the breeding farm was mostly women and children not old enough to be sold, and a limited number of men whose job was to impregnate as many slave women as possible. The slaves were often given hoods or bags over their heads to keep them from knowing who they were having forced sex with. It could be someone they know, perhaps a niece, aunt, sister, or their own mother. The breeders only wanted a child that could be sold.

Richmond also had five railroads. Slaves could be shipped both by rail and boat which allowed slaves to arrive in better condition and thus fetch a higher price. Slavery was more than man’s inhumanity towards man. It was always about economics. Cheap labor that allowed America to compete with other nations. Much of America was literally built on slavery. Texas schoolbooks are now trying to make it sound not quite so bad. The breeding farms receive no mention at all.

Note that this was not only morally acceptable at the time, but it was subsidised by government insofar as police and soldiers would return any slaves who ran away from the rape farm.

[Doug64]

March 13, Thursday

General McClellan has recognized that his long-cherished Urbanna plan is no longer practical. General Johnston’s retreat has frustrated McClellan’s design to outflank the Confederates, Johnston’s new line south of the Rappahannock putting him in good position to thwart a landing at Urbanna. McClellan still doesn’t want to march due south to Richmond, a move that will surely bring on several full-scale battles. After a day of solitary thinking, McClellan presents to his four corps commanders another plan, though not a new one. He had offered it up the previous month as an alternative to the Urbanna plan. This plan also calls for an amphibious expedition. The army will sail past Urbanna, continue down Chesapeake Bay, and land at the tip of the Virginia Peninsula, that tongue of history-rich land between the York and James Rivers. There Fort Monroe, held by the Federals despite their loss of Norfolk just three miles across Hampton Roads, will serve as a secure base for the march up the Peninsula to Richmond. Fort Monroe is about 70 miles southeast of Richmond—ten miles shorter than from Manassas. McClellan has been told that the roads on the Peninsula are passable at all seasons. In addition, though the CSS Virginia has the James River bottled up on the southern side of the Peninsula, McClellan is counting on the Federal navy for support on the York River to the north. The four corps commanders endorse the plan unanimously, though on condition that the Navy guarantees full cooperation around the Peninsula, and enough troops must be left to the defense of Washington to give the capital “an entire feeling of security.” President Lincoln once more emphasizes to McClellan, through the Secretary of War, that Manassas Junction and Washington must be left secure, although he agrees that the army can move via the Peninsula. The letter ends, “at all events, move such remainder of the army at once in pursuit of the enemy by some route.”

In St. Louis General Halleck assumes command of the new Department of the Mississippi.

Federal forces of John Pope severely bombards Confederate works at New Madrid, Missouri, on the Mississippi. There is fighting at Spring River, Arkansas, and Beach Creek Bridge, Tennessee.

For once, everything seems to be going General Burnside’s way. His link-up with the Navy was made on time, the flotilla got underway with few delays, and even the notorious coastal weather has cooperated—for once the waters were calm, and the vessels steamed up the Neuse estuary under a bright sun. Now early in the morning, the 11,000 Federal troops disembark unopposed at Slocomb’s Creek, 16 miles below New Berne, North Carolina. But now the weather turns against them and by sundown the column has advanced to within two miles of the Confederate defense line, where they bivouack for the night in a driving rain. The foul weather makes it impossible to bring forward any artillery except some light naval howitzers. Nor is there any reserve ammunition on hand, Burnside’s men will go into battle with only 40 rounds in their cartridge boxes.

Confederate forces in New Mexico Territory under H.H. Sibley enter Santa Fe. With the capture of the town, the Confederate conquest of New Mexico is virtually complete. Colonel Canby is isolated at Fort Craig. Now only Fort Union bars the way to a Confederate invasion of Colorado, and Sibley doesn’t consider the post to be an obstacle. Spies tell him that the 800-man garrison is demoralized by Canby’s defeat at Valverde and the approach of the triumphant Confederate army.

In Richmond General Lee is charged by President Davis with “the conduct of military operations under the direction of the President” in the armies of the Confederacy, which seems to be a sort of unofficial general in chief, but is never clearly defined. Since Lee’s disastrous campaign in western Virginia he has been tasked with organizing coastal defenses in Georgia.

[Doug64]

For comic fans out there, check out The Hated on Kickstarter. It’s set in 1872 in a US that lost the Civil War. The PDF is $4, the campaign currently has 28 hours left.

March 14, Friday

The Confederate forces at New Bern, North Carolina, have girded themselves for the expected attack, working around the clock to bolster the city’s defenses. It wasn’t hard for them to realize that after Roanoke Island they would be next, in Federal hands New Berne would be a marshaling point for drives up and down the coast and inland along the Atlantic & North Carolina Railroad toward the vital junction of Goldsboro—there the line from New Bern intersects with the Wilmington & Weldon Railroad, which carries vital supplies to Richmond and points north. So by now a line of log-and-earth breastworks have been established downriver from the town. From Fort Thompson, on the west bank of the Neuse, the line extends westward for about two and a half miles to a two-gun battery on the edge of a swamp along Brice Creek. Manning the defense line are approximately 4,500 green North Carolina troops.

Now at daybreak, in a thick mist, Burnside gives the order to advance against those fortifications. The same three generals that led their men to victory at Roanoke Island lead their men forward, while the Federal fleet moves up the Neuse to bombard Fort Thompson in support of the ground forces. The first contact is on the Confederate left flank but the five Federal regiments there are brought to a standstill, hit not only by enemy fire but also by shells from the Federal fleet. (Commander Rowan will later try to justify his indiscriminate shelling: “I know the persuasive effect of a 9-inch shell, and thought it better to kill a Union man or two than to lose the effect of my moral suasion.”) With the Union brigade on the Confederate left pinned down, the action shifts to the right. There a Massachusetts regiment manages to push the Confederate militia out of the brickyard at the railroad tracks and hit the right flank of the militia in the adjacent entrenchments. But their success is short lived, with the other Confederate regiments holding firm and returning fire. Two other Union regiments manage to hold the ground the 21st Massachusetts has taken, but cannot advance further and call for additional support from the vanguard of the center brigade. The 4th Rhode Island and the 8th Connecticut respond in a charge that sweeps through the brickyard, threatening the Confederate line. Outflanked and short of ammunition, the entire Confederate line begins the disintegrate and their commander, General Branch, orders a retreat over the Trent River Bridge to New Bern. The retreat quickly turns into a rout. Many of the troops that make it to New Bern head straight to the railroad depot and scramble aboard a westbound train, which luck would have it is just pulling out. General Branch makes no further attempt to defend the town, ordering his regiments west to Kinston where he hopes to regroup and oppose the next Federal advance.

Casualties are 471 for the Federals, including 90 killed. Casualties are lighter for the Confederates, 64 killed and 101 wounded. But 413 are missing; according to Branch, about 200 of them were “prisoners and the remainder at home.” As at Winton, when Rowan’s gunboats tie up at the docks they find a city empty of virtually all but the Blacks and poorest Whites. Another serviceable base has been established for Federal inland expeditions and a new vantage point gained for cultivating the considerable pro-Union elements of North Carolina.

On the Mississippi after severe Union cannonading on the thirteenth, it is found that the Confederates have evacuated the works at New Madrid, Missouri, fleeing to Island No. 10 or across the river. General John Pope has not yet conquered this bastion on the Mississippi, but he has made a good start. Federals now occupy the New Madrid earthworks, have secured considerable supplies and guns, and begun to concentrate on the island itself and the fortifications east of the river in Tennessee.

In the Shenandoah Valley, Virginia, one of General Banks’ divisions under Brigadier General John Sedwick has marched east.

Elsewhere in Tennessee there is fighting at Big Creek Gap and Jacksborough; on the Tennessee River W.T. Sherman, who had taken his command toward Eastport, Mississippi, returns toward Pittsburg Landing, Tennessee, south of Savannah; at Pittsburg Landing some explorations or reconnaissances are being carried out.

In a change of boundaries of departments, Major General John C. Pemberton is assigned to the Confederate Department of South Carolina and Georgia.

President Davis declares martial law in threatened areas of southeastern Virginia.

In Washington President Lincoln tries to explain that compensated emancipation of the slaves “would not be half as onerous, as would be an equal sum, raised now, for the indefinite prossecution [sic] of the war.”

[Doug64]

March 15, Saturday

As the divisions of W.T. Sherman and Stephen Hurlbut come into Pittsburg Landing on the Tennessee, Major General Buell is ordered by Halleck to head from Nashville toward Savannah, Tennessee. Buell is to aid Grant’s advancing army, but he is seriously delayed by lack of bridges over the Duck River.

For days John Hunt Morgan carries out Confederate operations about Gallatin, Tennessee.

There is a skirmish near Marshall, Missouri.

The Federal Department of Florida is merged into the Department of the South with Major General David Hunter commanding and headquarters at Hilton Head, South Carolina.

President Davis tells General Joseph E. Johnston that there is no immediate necessity for throwing troops into Richmond and that the general should decide on his new position.

President Lincoln approves an act of Congress authorizing a joint commission of the United States, France, and Great Britain to consider means of preserving Atlantic fisheries.

General Halleck in St. Louis exonerates General Grant of the rather superficial charges arising out of Fort Donelson and restores him to field command of the forces in Tennessee. Grant replaces C.F. Smith, incapacitated by a field injury.

Confederate General Lovell, concerned about the Union fleet working to enter the mouth of the Mississippi, declares martial law in New Orleans.

[Doug64]

March 16, Sunday

There is light skirmishing in the Pittsburg Landing area of Tennessee as Confederates try to find out what the Federals are up to.

Other action is at Pound Gap, Kentucky, and near Marshal, Missouri.

Martial law is instituted by the United States in San Francisco, California, as city defenses are increased in view of rumors of possible attack.

[Doug64]

March 17, Monday

At Alexandria, Virginia, only a week after the embarrassing march to Manassas, the first of General McClellan’s divisions embarks for shipment to the James and York rivers—one day ahead of the deadline imposed by President Lincoln. “The worst is over,” McClellan reassures Secretary of War Stanton by letter. “Rely upon it that I will carry this thing through handsomely.”

In Tennessee Major General Grant regains his active command and as two more divisions arrive, sets up his headquarters in a mansion at Savannah, north of the army concentration point at Pittsburg Landing on the Tennessee River. Grant is anxious to maintain the momentum of his victory at Fort Donelson and strike the Confederates while they are still reeling. But General Halleck, as ever cautious, checks the advance until General Buell’s army has joined him. General Buell will be slowed down by the retreating Confederates, who burn bridges in their wake. Grant chafes at the delay, and sends telegrams to Halleck urging an immediate attack before the enemy regroups, only for Halleck to not bother to respond. So Grant frets and fumes to get on with the attack. He spends much of his time waiting for Buell planning the coming campaign at his headquarters in Savannah, leaving command of the army encamped at Pittsburg Landing to Brigadier General William Tecumseh Sherman—and completely discounting the possibility that Sidney Johnston’s forces might attack him first.

There is a skirmish at Riddle’s Point, Missouri, as well.

[Doug64]

March 18, Tuesday

A major Confederate Cabinet change: Judah P. Benjamin, often criticized for his management of the War Department, is named Secretary of State by President Davis to succeed resigned R.M.T. Hunter, who has gone to the Senate. George W. Randolph is appointed Secretary of War; he has served in both the Army and the Navy and is willing to confine himself to administrative duties. Attorney General Thomas Bragg steps down for Thomas H. Watts of Alabama. The shifts represent internal politics of the Confederate government and its ongoing search for a really able War Secretary.

In Mississippi the first units of Albert Sidney Johnston’s men from Murfreesboro begin coming into Corinth, about 20 miles from the Union encampment at Pittsburg Landing, but the move will not be completed until March 24.

There is a skirmish at Middletown, Virginia, and fighting at Point Pleasant, Missouri, part of Pope’s Federal drive on Island No. 10. Until the end of the month in Missouri there will be Union activity and skirmishing in Johnson, St. Clair, and Henry counties.

[Doug64]

March 19, Wednesday

Action of the day is confined to skirmishing at Elk Mountain, western Virginia, and Strasburg, Virginia. In the latter, Federal troops under James Shields have advanced against Jackson’s retreating Confederates in the Shenandoah. Meanwhile, most of the remainder of Banks’ command in the valley has been ordered east toward Washington, to help protect the capital.

There is a reconnaissance of several days’ duration by Federals on May River, South Carolina.

[Doug64]

March 20, Thursday

In the Shenandoah Valley, Virginia, General Shields starts pulling his Union troops out of Strasburg north toward Winchester, 18 miles away, where he can best protect the Baltimore & Ohio tracks. His 9,000 men are intended to be the only division of General Banks’ army to remain in the Valley.

There is a skirmish at Philippi, western Virginia, a Union reconnaissance to Gainesville and another to Dumfries, Virginia.

Burnside’s Federals from New Berne, North Carolina, move toward Washington, North Carolina, capturing the town on the twenty-first.

In South Carolina there are operations near Bluffton and brief fights at Buckingham and Hunting Island until the twenty-fourth, part of the Federal operations from Hilton Head.

After a long sea voyage Major General Benjamin F. Butler assumes command of the Department of the Gulf at Ship Island, Mississippi, continuing the build-up of Northern forces preparing for an attack on New Orleans.

In New Mexico Territory, Confederate Colonel H.H. Sibley’s small army marches out of Santa Fe, headed north for Fort Union.

[Doug64]

March 21, Friday

Brigadier General Alpheus Williams marches east from Winchester, Virginia, leaving General Shields’s division the only one of Banks’ army left. Colonel Turner Ashby, scouting the Union positions with his cavalry, discovers this and sends a courier galloping to inform General “Stonewall” Jackson. To Jackson it is instantly clear that Banks is in the process of doing precisely what he himself has been ordered to prevent, leaving the Valley to support General McClellan’s army.

There is a slight affair at McKay’s Farm, Missouri and a reconnaissance and skirmish at Cumberland Gap, Tennessee.

A Norfolk, Virginia, paper, the Day-Book, complains about increased drinking, particularly among Confederate officers, who are said to imbibe “in quantities which would astonish the nerves of a cast-iron lamp-post, and a quality which would destroy the digestive organs of the ostrich.”