On the evening of the 22d, the army, about twelve thousand strong, went
into camp within an easy day’s march of Front Royal, where, rumor had
it, was stationed a considerable force of the enemy. Here the
dissatisfaction that had so long existed in the First Maryland broke out
into open mutiny, and the majority of the men in the war companies threw
down their arms and demanded an immediate discharge. It was in vain that
General Steuart and Colonel Johnson expostulated with them upon their
disgraceful conduct, but they declared they had served out their term of
enlistment, and would serve no longer, and when next morning we resumed
our march, nearly one-half the regiment was disarmed and under guard.
The affair was kept concealed from General Jackson, as it was still
hoped the men would return to reason, for it was not calculated to
impress him very favorably with the troops from whom he expected so
much.
[Illustration: Brig. Gen. GEO. H. STEUART.]
A halt was made about five miles from Front Royal, and whilst resting
ourselves by the wayside, an aid-de-camp was observed to dash up to
Colonel Johnson and hand him a dispatch. It took him but an instant to
acquaint himself with its contents, when, turning to his command, in a
voice tremulous with suppressed anger and with a face flushed with
mortification and shame, called it to “attention.”
“I have just received an order from General Jackson that very nearly
concerns yourselves,” he said, “and I will read it to you:”
“Colonel Johnson will move the First Maryland to the front with all
dispatch, and in conjunction with Wheat’s battalion attack the enemy
at Front Royal. The army will halt until you pass.
JACKSON.”
“You have heard the order, and I must confess are in a pretty condition
to obey it. I will have to return it with the endorsement upon the back
that ‘the First Maryland refuses to meet the enemy, though ordered by
General Jackson.’ Before this day I was proud to call myself a
Marylander, but now, God knows, I would rather be known as anything
else. Shame on you to bring this stigma upon the fair fame of your
native State—to cause the finger of scorn to be pointed at those who
confided to your keeping their most sacred trust—their honor and that of
the glorious old State. Marylanders you call yourselves. Profane not
that hallowed name again, for it is not yours. What Marylander ever
before threw down his arms and deserted his colors in the presence of
the enemy, and those arms, and those colors, too, placed in your hands
by a woman? Never before has one single blot defaced her honored
history. Could it be possible to conceive a crime more atrocious, an
outrage more damnable? Go home and publish to the world your infamy.
Boast of it when you meet your fathers and mothers, brothers, sisters
and sweethearts. Tell them it was you who, when brought face to face
with the enemy, proved yourselves recreants, and acknowledged yourselves
to be cowards. Tell them this, and see if you are not spurned from their
presence like some loathsome leper, and despised, detested, nay,
abhorred by those whose confidence you have so shamefully betrayed; you
will wander over the face of the earth with the brand of ‘coward,’
‘traitor,’ indelibly imprinted upon your foreheads, and in the end sink
into a dishonored grave, unwept for, uncared for, leaving behind as a
heritage to your posterity the scorn and contempt of every honest man
and virtuous woman in the land.”
The Colonel’s address, of which I have given the reader but a faint
idea, was delivered with much feeling and listened to with close
attention, and scarcely had he concluded when a wild yell broke the
painful stillness that had prevailed, and a simultaneous rush was made
for the ordnance wagon by those to whom he had just administered so
scathing a rebuke. Never before, perhaps, had they seized their arms
with such avidity, or buckled on their equipments with greater rapidity.
“Now, sir,” they cried out, “lead us against the enemy, and we will
prove to you that we are not cowards, and that neither have we forgotten
these arms were placed in our hands by a woman.”
“Forward!” was the command, and at the double-quick the regiment passed
along the whole army amid the most deafening cheers. “We are going to
have some work cut out now, boys, for the Marylanders are going to the
front,” could be heard on all sides as we moved along, and every man
inwardly determined that work _should_ be cut out if material could be
found.
On the right of the army we joined Wheat with his battalion of
Louisianians, and with them moved swiftly upon the doomed Federals
holding Front Royal. We approached within a mile of the town, but saw no
signs of the enemy. “Another disappointment,” ran down the line, but the
next moment two or three frightened soldiers in blue broke cover from a
picket post, and fled in the direction of the village. They were pursued
by several mounted men, and speedily overtaken and brought back. Upon
being questioned, they told us that they belonged to the First Maryland,
and that the force in town consisted of that regiment, two companies of
Pennsylvanians, two pieces of artillery, and a squadron of cavalry, the
latter having joined them that very day, all under the command of
Colonel John R. Kenly, who did not dream that Jackson was within fifty
miles of him. So at last we had met the much boasted Yankee First
Maryland, and although greatly outnumbered, we were ready to take up the
gage of battle so defiantly thrown down to us some time before. First
Maryland against First Maryland! It was, indeed, a singular coincidence.
We approached the town rapidly, and entered the main street before the
enemy were aware of our approach. For a minute they resisted our
advance, and a sharp exchange of musketry shots ensued. They were
quickly driven out, however, with the loss of several in killed, wounded
and prisoners.
The whole command had now taken the alarm, and assembled behind their
artillery, which was posted on a hill that commanded the town and its
approaches. Dashing through the streets, we were soon in the open
country, when the companies commanded by Captains Nicholas, Herbert and
Goldsborough were deployed as skirmishers, with Wheat on the left, the
whole being under the command of Lieutenant Colonel E. R. Dorsey (who
had reached that rank by reason of seniority upon the promotion of Elzey
and Steuart), whilst Colonel Johnson commanded the reserves.
The enemy now opened his artillery with great precision, and his shell
began to tell in our ranks. Nothing daunted, however, the gallant
fellows moved steadily forward, and reached the very foot of the hill
upon which he was posted. From there the fight was stubbornly waged for
at least two hours, with no apparent advantage on either side. In the
meantime the troops of Jackson were moving to the right and left to
envelop the enemy and cut off his retreat. Kenly saw the movement, and
determined to withdraw his forces and cross the river (immediately in
his rear) if possible. On his right was the turnpike bridge, and on his
left, in our front, was the long and high trestle-work of the Manassas
Gap Railroad. Dorsey divined his purpose, and, as the enemy commenced to
fall back, immediately ordered a charge along the whole line. With a
yell the men responded to the command, and the long line of skirmishers
pressed forward in pursuit. The fight would have terminated then and
there had not the Louisiana battalion stumbled upon the enemy’s camp,
and bent on plunder, the threats and entreaties of their officers were
for some time in vain, and when they were at length prevailed upon to
move forward, it was found the enemy in their front, with artillery and
cavalry, had escaped over the bridge. Not so in front of the Maryland
command. The enemy were closely pressed to the river’s bank, where,
finding it impossible to escape across the trestle-work, they threw down
their arms in a body. By this time a heavy force of cavalry had forded
the river some distance below, and charging the remainder of Kenly’s
command, which was rapidly retreating up the turnpike, captured it
almost to a man, not, however, without meeting with a desperate
resistance, in which many were killed and wounded on both sides.
Thus ended the battle of Front Royal, if it can be so termed, and in
which Marylander met Marylander for the first time in the war. It has
been said Kenly’s command had fought a vastly superior force of the
Confederates, whereas it was a much inferior one, which, however did not
compel him to withdraw from the position he had taken in front of the
town, but the flank movement by heavy bodies of our troops did, and it
was then we pressed our advantage. The actual number of assailants prior
to his recrossing the river with what remained of his command, did not
exceed four hundred men. And it has been more than once asserted, also,
that Colonel Kenly did not offer the spirited resistance to the
Confederate advance expected of him, and that there was no reason why he
should have lost his command. This is doing him injustice. He fought his
troops like the brave man that he is, and Commissary Banks can thank him
for being instrumental in saving the little he did from the wreck of his
army at Strasburg and Winchester. He committed one great, inexcusable
error, however, in not having his cavalry scouts and pickets out, but it
is said they reached him but an hour or two before our attack, although
he had called for them several days before. If this be true, he deserves
no blame or censure for his misfortune at Front Royal.
The morning after the fight, when the prisoners were drawn up in line,
it was truly amusing to see the men of the two Maryland regiments greet
each other. “Why, if there ain’t my brother Bill;” “And there’s my
cousin Jim,” could be heard, whilst nearly all recognized old friends
and acquaintances, whom they greeted cordially, and divided with them
the rations which had just changed hands.
The kindest attention was shown the wounded officers and men, the former
being paroled, and allowed to accept the invitation of the citizens to
accompany them to their homes, where they were provided with all they
required. And whilst we were thus treating our enemies in the field, the
cowardly ruffians in Baltimore, who had remained at home, were brutally
assaulting every citizen there suspected of sympathizing with the people
of the South in their struggle for independence, because some poltroon,
who had deserted his companions at the first fire, reported they had
been murdered in cold blood to a man after having surrendered
themselves.
The officers of the First Maryland Confederate called upon those of the
First Maryland Federal, and offered them any assistance in their power,
and in some instances it was thankfully accepted. Colonel Kenly was
quite badly wounded, by either a pistol ball or a sabre cut, in the
head, and at the time that I saw him appeared to be suffering much
mental depression, caused by his misfortune. His wound he seemed to care
but little for; but, as he paced the floor, would, from time to time,
bend over his adjutant, Tarr, who was desperately wounded, and gaze
anxiously in his face.