daughter of the Hon. Augustine H. Shepperd, at Good Spring, the
country-seat of the bride's father, near Salem, North Carolina.
Shortly after the marriage he returned to his command, then in
Washington Territory, his wife accompanying him and remaining with
him until they returned to the east, arriving at Washington in the
latter part of February, 1861. There they remained a few days, and
on the 3d of March, the day before Mr. Lincoln was inaugurated,
they left for North Carolina. This short stay at Washington at this
juncture was a crisis in the young officer's life. He had seen
a sectional feeling arise in the army. He now found the people
divided. The Confederate Government was already established;
troops had been organized and drilled in the South and Fort Sumter
invested. He was perplexed as to what he ought to do; whether
to continue in the service of the United States or resign his
commission; for in case of war he could not take part against the
South, and this would be required of him if he held his commission
in the army. He became satisfied, after considering carefully the
situation and observing closely the tendency of affairs, that war
was inevitable, and from his knowledge of the character and temper
of the two sections he knew the war would be a terrible one. He
determined to cast his lot with his people of the South, and on the
21st of March resigned his commission in the army, and immediately
offered his services to the Confederate Government at Montgomery. He
was appointed captain in the artillery service of the provisional
army, but was shortly afterwards sent by the government to Baltimore
to take charge of the Confederate recruiting depot at that place.
The time has passed when the motives of the men who resigned their
commissions in the armies of the United States and took service
afterwards in the Confederate armies can be impugned. Impartial
history has pronounced their conduct natural, consistent, and
sincere. In this connection it is interesting to recall a sentence
from the memorable address of Mr. Edmunds in the United States
Senate in 1883, on the life and character of Senator B. H. Hill:
"The notion of fidelity to one's own State, whether her cause be
thought wise and right or not, is almost a natural instinct; and
whether it be defensible on broad grounds or not, who does not
sympathize with it?"
In the first week of May, 1861, when North Carolina began to
organize her volunteer troops, Captain Pender returned and entered
her service at the "Old Fair Grounds," near Raleigh, Governor Ellis
appointing him to drill and instruct the officers of the companies
of the First Regiment--the Bethel Regiment. After that regiment was
dispatched to Virginia he was assigned to duty as Commandant of the
Camp of Instruction at Garysburg, and, upon the formation there of
the Third Regiment of Volunteers, was elected its colonel on the
16th of May, 1861. At this time he was twenty-seven years old, about
five feet ten inches in height, well formed and straight; graceful
in his carriage; with large, lustrous, dark eyes, dark-brown hair,
an olive complexion, head almost faultless in shape, a mouth
clear cut, and lips firmly compressed, and a voice soft, low, and
distinct. The combined dignity and ease of his manner charmed all
who came about him. The sweet modesty of his unassuming bearing
was so striking that it won all to him; and this characteristic is
always mentioned, even now, by those who knew him, as one of his
most attractive charms; and it underwent no diminution in after
years when he had won such distinguished military honors. His modest
and unassuming character was not always understood by those who
did not know him well. The following is an instance: He had fought
more than half a dozen pitched battles under General Jackson before
the two ever met socially. One day General Jackson said to Major
Avery, who was well acquainted with them both: "What sort of a man
is General Pender? I'm embarrassed at his never having been to see
me. I know he is a fine soldier, gallant and skillful on the field,
and his troops are well disciplined. I never fail to be impressed
with his camps; they are always clean, orderly and comfortable. I've
made it a rule, though, never to recommend an officer for promotion
unless I have a personal and social acquaintance with him, and this
will some day embarrass me."
However, from the beginning of his career to the end of it he knew
the value of discipline, and though of a kind and gentle disposition
he was firm in the management of his men. Throughout the entire
period of his service the camps of his troops always showed the
marks of order and system and the men the effects of training and
discipline.
General W. G. Lewis, in a letter to Mr. D. W. Gilliam, says, after
noting a visit paid by himself to General Pender shortly after
the battle of Fredericksburg: "He received me most cordially and
courteously, and I had a very pleasant visit and one of profit to
me, as I saw plainly in his camps the results of true military
discipline and careful attention from headquarters. His camp was a
model of cleanliness, regularity and good order; his sentinels and
guard saluted in strict military style; all officers wore the badges
of their rank. I was particularly struck with this, as it was not,
by far, universal in the Army of Northern Virginia." Discipline was
enforced, as he often said, for the comfort and safety of his men,
and because the fiery gallantry of the Southern soldier would be
uselessly expended unless it was systematically and scientifically
directed; and he used to say that discipline was a protection to the
good soldier, in that it forced the doubtful one to the performance
of his duty, and thus reduced the work and the peril of the former.
Colonel Pender, with his regiment, was near Suffolk, Va., until
after the 15th of August, 1861, when he took command of Fisher's
famous Sixth Regiment at Manassas. He was appointed colonel of the
Sixth by Governor Clark, on the unanimous petition of its officers.
That appointment, at that time, was the highest compliment that
could have been paid to a North Carolinian. None but those who are
old enough to remember those days can appreciate what honor it
was to be accounted worthy to command the men whom Fisher led at
Manassas; though that battle was full of all sorts of blunders,
strategical and tactical, in the Confederate commanders, and turned
out a barren victory, the troops behaved admirably, and this
regiment as well as the best.
The Confederate army occupied about its original position near
Manassas until March, 1862, when it was transferred, under the
command of General Joseph E. Johnston, to the Peninsula to meet
McClellan's "On to Richmond" from that direction. As the Federals
advanced the Confederates retired upon Richmond, taking position on
the south side of the Chickahominy, and from two to five miles on
the east and north of the city. In the last week in May two Federal
corps, Keyes' and Heintzelman's, crossed that stream and entrenched
themselves across the Williamsburg stage road, near Seven Pines.
General Johnston ordered the attack of the 31st May on the enemy's
left. General Keyes, in his report of the battle, says: "The left of
my line was all protected by white oak swamps, but the right was on
ground so favorable to the approach of the enemy and so far from the
Chickahominy that if Johnston had attacked an hour or two earlier
than he did I could have made but a feeble defense, comparatively,
and every man of us would have been killed, captured or driven into
the swamps or river before assistance could have reached us." Owing
to misunderstandings and jealousies between the Confederate general
officers only five brigades of the twenty-three which were ordered
for the attack on the enemy's left were used in that attack, and
some of them fought knee and waist deep in mud and water in a white
oak swamp trying to get at an enemy entrenched on high ground.
There was great gallantry on the part of the Confederates, and the
carnage was dreadful. General D. H. Hill, who made the morning
attack with his division, after numerous repulses in and around the
swamp finally carried the enemy's position from the front--Couch's
Division of Keyes' Corps falling back northward to and beyond Fair
Oaks, a station on the Richmond and York River Railroad. From a
point just outside Fair Oaks, on the north, there is an intersection
at right angles of the Nine-Mile Road to Richmond and a road from
Grape Vine Bridge on the Chickahominy to the station. On the
Grape Vine Bridge road, about a thousand yards from Fair Oaks,
Couch's Division halted and formed a line facing toward the south,
information having been received that Sumner's Corps had crossed
the river at Grape Vine Bridge and was advancing to the assistance
of the Union troops. About 5 o'clock in the afternoon Colonel
Pender, with his Sixth Regiment, arrived at Fair Oaks from toward
Richmond, on the Nine-Mile road, in advance of Whiting's Brigade.
Line of battle having been instantly formed facing to the south,
the regiment, without support and under direct orders from either
General Whiting or General G. W. Smith, went rapidly forward. After
an advance of probably a third of a mile without coming up with the
enemy, Colonel Pender discovered a large force of Federals in the
act of forming a line from column by companies, near the Grape Vine
Bridge road and well to his left and rear. They had seen him in his
perilous position, and were preparing to capture or destroy him.
There really seemed no chance of escape; but as quick as lightning,
and with coolness equaling his bravery, the order "By the left
flank, file left, double quick!" rang out in as clear and musical a
voice as ever was heard on battlefield. The old regiment, the best
drilled and disciplined in the army of Northern Virginia, moved as
if on parade, and before the enemy had completed their formation it
was upon them, pouring volley after volley into their very faces;
and under the suddenness and fury of the attack the foe staggered
and reeled, while the glorious soldier withdrew his men and rejoined
his brigade, which was just coming up. Our hero was here like
Jackson in quickness of comprehension and promptness of decision; he
was like Soult in his tactical skill; he was like Junot in his fiery
onslaught. There never was a more courageous and skillful movement
made on any field. In the attack by Whiting's Brigade, which almost
immediately followed upon Colonel Pender's affair, the brigade was
repulsed and the troops retired in great disorder. Colonel Froebel,
of General Whiting's staff, who was present, in his report of the
battle says that Colonel Pender reformed the broken regiments and
restored the line by his courage and coolness. Mr. Davis was present
and witnessed Colonel Pender's behavior, and said to him on the
field, "_General_ Pender, I salute you!" General Stephen D. Lee thus
writes: "I was on the battlefield of Fair Oaks; saw him (General
Pender) and conversed with him before and after the battle. He
expressed his great satisfaction to me that he was literally made a
general on the field of battle for gallant and meritorious conduct
just performed, and said that it reminded him of such cases in
European armies, where such recognitions of soldierly conduct were
made."
Three days afterwards he was put in command of Pettigrew's Brigade
(Pettigrew having been wounded and captured), which he led
through the Seven Days' fight around Richmond. His commission as
brigadier-general was handed to him July 22, 1862, to date from June
3. His brigade was composed of North Carolinians, the Thirteenth,
Sixteenth, Twenty-second, Thirty-fourth, and Thirty-eighth
Regiments, and General Pender commanded it until he was promoted.
General Johnston having been severely wounded in the battle of the
31st, the command of the army was given to General Lee. Within
less than a month he concentrated around Richmond the largest
army the Confederacy ever had in the field, composed of the very
pick and flower of the South. There was little discipline in that
army, but there were the highest personal courage and the greatest
individuality of character among the men. Its antagonist, the
Army of the Potomac, under General McClellan, though possibly a
little inferior in numbers, was thoroughly organized, drilled, and
equipped. On the 23d of June General Jackson arrived at General
Lee's headquarters, having left his troops on the route from the
Valley to join General Lee in a contemplated attack upon McClellan's
right. It was agreed between the two generals that at sunrise on
the morning of the 26th Jackson's forces should attack the rear of
the Federal position at Mechanicsville and Beaver Dam, while a part
of Lee's army should make the attack there in front. On the 25th,
the divisions of the two Hills moved out, A. P. Hill's down the
Meadow Bridge and D. H. Hill's on the Mechanicsville road. Jackson
was waited for until about 3 o'clock of the afternoon of the 26th,
when, not being heard from, A. P. Hill impetuously began the attack
from the front, General Pender with his brigade being the first to
engage. He brushed back the enemy's advanced line to their main one
just behind and along Beaver Dam creek. The position was entrenched
and fortified with siege-guns, as well as light artillery, while the
creek just in front was made hopelessly impassable by all manner of
obstructions placed there for that purpose. The approach was over
an exposed plain about three-quarters of a mile wide and down the
slope to the creek, with no cover or protection. General Pender and
his brave North Carolinians swept over the plain and down the bottom
under a murderous fire of artillery and musketry to the brink of
the creek; nothing could live under that fire. The line wavered and
staggered back. Mr. Davis, who was on the field, seeing the charge
and the terrible repulse, ordered General D. H. Hill to send one of
his brigades to his assistance, and Ripley was sent. About dark,
Pender's lines having been reformed and joined by Ripley, a second
advance was made. Though General Pender and his brave Carolinians
knew what was before them, and had seen with their eyes that the
position could not be carried, yet they went forward with a yell,
many to their deaths, and many more to suffer from their bloody
wounds and broken limbs. There was no chance for Pender to show his
skill here, it was simply a forlorn undertaking. He obeyed orders.
General D. H. Hill, in his article, "Lee's Attack North of the
Chickahominy," in _Battles and Leaders of the Civil War_, writing
of Pender's attack on Beaver Dam, uses the following language: "The
result was as might have been foreseen, a bloody and disastrous
repulse. None of us knew of the formidable character of the works
on Beaver Dam. Our engineers seemed to know little of the country
and nothing of the fortifications on the creek. The maps furnished
the division commanders were worthless. The lack of knowledge of the
topography was inexcusable. They had plenty of time. The Federals
had been preparing for the movement all the winter, and McClellan's
movements up the Peninsula indicated what position he would take
up. The blood shed by the Southern troops was wasted in vain. They
could have been halted at Mechanicsville until Jackson had turned
the works on the creek, and all that waste of blood could have been
avoided. Ripley's Brigade was sent by me to the assistance of Pender
by the direct order of both Mr. Davis and General Lee. The attack
on the Beaver Dam entrenchments or the heights of Malvern Hill and
Gettysburg were all grand, but of exactly the kind of grandeur the
South could not afford."
The next morning only a line of skirmishers occupied the works on
Beaver Dam, the scene of yesterday's slaughter, the main line,
upon discovering Jackson's near presence on the night of the 26th,
having retreated to another strongly entrenched position extending
from Gaines's Mill to near Cold Harbor. The Confederates followed,
Pender hugging the Chickahominy, and then turning off by the mill
to one-half mile beyond Cold Harbor. Here Porter's Corps, being
well entrenched and supported by two other divisions sent to his
assistance, made one of the finest battles of the war, repulsing the
Confederates many times, holding Longstreet and the two Hills and
Jackson at bay until about night, when the lines were broken. A. P.
Hill's Corps was the first to attack. General Pender and his brave
soldiers did their full part there on that day, forgetting their
terrible experience of the day before. He was also at Frazier's
Farm--Glendale--on the 30th.
From Beaver Dam to Malvern Hill, inclusive, these battles were one
continuous series of Confederate assaults upon entrenched Union
positions with unparalleled slaughter of the attacking columns. The
Southerners lost, in killed and wounded, nearly twenty thousand
men, the Federals not much more than half that number. General
Longstreet, in _Battles and Leaders of the Civil War_, writes:
"General Lee's plans in the seven days' fight were excellent, but
very poorly executed." General E. P. Alexander, Chief of Artillery
of Longstreet's Corps, in an article in the _Southern Historical
Society Papers_ on the battle of Frazier's Farm, writes: "As no
one can go through the details of this action without surprise at
the fatal want of concert of action which characterized the many
gallant and bloody assaults of the Confederates, it is best to say
beforehand that it was but the persistent mishap of every offensive
battlefield which the army of Northern Virginia ever fought, and
that its causes were not peculiar to any one."
General Pender in his official report of these battles, while paying
full tribute to the memory of the dead, did not fail to confer honor
on the meritorious survivors. He says of one of our townsmen, now
a distinguished lawyer, "Lieutenant Hinsdale, my acting Assistant
Adjutant-General, deserves the highest praise."
Lee's shattered brigades, somewhat gotten together after the fights
around Richmond, commenced the Maryland campaign. It was begun to
get rid of McClellan around Richmond, and also to strike General
Pope, who was advancing from Washington with another army by way of
Culpeper, before he and McClellan could unite.
Jackson moved off first, and finding the enemy at Cedar Run, or
Slaughter Station, on the Rapidan, he attacked at once. He had his
hands full, and for a time the battle seemed to be lost. At the
supreme moment Pender came on the scene, and, by a beautiful flank
movement, skillfully and energetically made, reanimated the wavering
Confederate line, and in a general advance the enemy was beaten off
the field. General Pender, in his official report of this battle,
makes mention of a young soldier, then serving with him, who is
now the accomplished editor of the _News and Observer_, in terms
most complimentary: "Captain Ashe, my Assistant Adjutant-General,
deserves notice for his conduct, being found almost at every point
almost at the same time, cheering on the men."
At second Manassas, a few days afterwards, Jackson's Corps received
every attack of nearly the whole of the Federal army without
yielding. The fire was delivered very often during that day at
not more than ten paces. There General Pender was like Ney. The
all-importance of holding the line until Longstreet should arrive
was appreciated by him. He exposed himself here almost recklessly.
At Ox Hill, or Chantilly, where General Phil. Kearney was killed,
General Pender again led the movement. He was wounded here again. On
these fields his superior generalship was conspicuously displayed.
From these battles his reputation was established as a skillful
leader. At Winchester, Harper's Ferry, and Sharpsburg he was a
commanding figure, always in place, with his troops well in hand on
the march and in battle. His superiors in rank in every movement
confided in his skill as well as in his courage.
The battle of Fredericksburg ended the campaign of 1862. In this
battle General Pender received the highest encomiums for the steady
and cool bravery with which he held his brigade under a protracted
fire from artillery, the most deadly of the war. It was a great
triumph of discipline, skill, and valor. He was again wounded here.
General Longstreet spent the winter of 1862-'63 with two divisions
of his corps at and near Suffolk, Virginia, procuring supplies
in eastern North Carolina. Before he returned to General Lee
at Fredericksburg, Hooker, who was in charge of the Army of
the Potomac, more than one hundred and twenty thousand strong,
crossed the Rapidan and took position on Lee's left flank near
Chancellorsville. The Confederate army numbered about fifty-five
thousand of all arms. Instead of promptly pressing his advantage,
Hooker delayed, and Lee and Jackson acted. This battle was perfect
in both strategy and tactics, and advanced Generals Lee and Jackson
to the forefront of military commanders. The Confederate soldiers
could not add to their laurels already won. In this battle of
Chancellorsville General Pender and his brigade made a name which
will last as long as the fame of the battle itself. All of us are
familiar with the first day's battle. Howard's Corps was routed by
D. H. Hill's old division, commanded by General Rodes. The tangled
growth of the wilderness and the darkness necessarily threw into
great confusion the Confederate troops which had made the attack.
While they were being reformed and reduced to order, and some of
the brigades relieved by fresh men, the enemy, with great numbers,
who had not been engaged, arrived, and, placing their artillery
at short range, opened fire with fatal effect. Everything which
had been gained seemed to be lost; and, when it was thought that
the Confederate line could not be held, General Jackson, after he
had received his death wound, recognizing in the darkness General
Pender, who had relieved one of Rodes' brigades, said to him: "You
must hold your ground, General Pender, you must hold your ground,
sir!" and he held his ground. This was General Jackson's last
command.
On the next morning early the handful of Confederates saw three
times their numbers in a wilderness country, thoroughly entrenched,
waiting to receive their attack. The assault _had_ to be made.
Sedgwick, with his corps, was in rear and flank at Fredericksburg,
opposed by Early, who was too weak to cope with him, and Hooker's
main force was between Lee and Richmond. It was a terrible day--that
Sunday, the 3d of May, 1863. General Heth, in his official report of
the battle, says that Pender and Thomas, the left of A. P. Hill's
Division, opened the battle. They were repulsed in the first assault
with great loss, but in the second charge they carried the day.
Pender won more glory in this charge than any other of the heroic
souls who took part in it.
General Lee, in his official report of this battle, said: "General
Pender led his brigade to the attack under a destructive fire,
bearing the colors of a regiment in his own hands up to and over the
entrenchments with the most distinguished gallantry."
After the wounding of General A. P. Hill on that day, General Pender
was put in command of that officer's division and was wounded late
that afternoon. His own official report of this action proves the
modesty and magnanimity of his great and lofty nature. He said:
"I can truly say that my brigade fought May 3d with unsurpassed
courage and determination. I never knew them to act universally so
well. I noticed no skulking, and they never showed any hesitation in
following their colors. My list in killed and wounded will show how
manfully they fought on that glorious day. After having witnessed
the fighting of nearly all the troops that fought on the left of
the road, I am satisfied with my own, but by no means claim any
superiority. All that I saw behaved as heroes."
No wonder everybody loved and admired General Pender!