WILLIAMSBURGH.
Battle of Williamsburgh--The army not organized--The medical
department--Hooker's gallant fight--Hancock's charge--McClellan
at Yorktown--Night on the battle-field.
Early on the morning of the 5th skirmishing commenced. The division of
Hooker was posted on the left of the road from Lee's Mills to
Williamsburgh, and our own division held the road, stretching mostly to
the right of it. Fort Magruder was directly in front of us, commanding
the road. All that part of the army which had advanced on the right,
that is, on the road from Yorktown, were massed as fast as they arrived,
awaiting orders. Great delay was experienced in getting the troops in
position, as there seemed to be no harmony of action. Every general of a
division seemed to do what pleased him, without orders from higher
authority.
General Sumner was in command of the troops on the field, but from some
cause seemed not to be able to combine his forces in such a manner as to
bear effectually upon the lines of the enemy. One of the serious
difficulties was getting artillery to the front. The roads had become
very muddy from the rain during the night, and were blocked up with the
immense multitude of wagons, so that artillery could not pass. Here was
sadly exemplified the grand defect of our army--the want of
organization.
Our army was an enormous heterogeneous mass, without any pretense of a
system to centralize and harmonize its movements. An army is not
organized by throwing it into brigades and divisions; this is but the
first and easiest step. The _departments_ must be so organized that each
performs well its part, without interference with another. In this case
the quartermaster's department sadly interfered with the others. Every
regimental quartermaster was for himself, and, as a natural result, the
immense trains were thrown into great disorder, impeding the movements
of all the other branches of the service. No one seemed at liberty to
bring order out of this confusion; and thus artillery and wagons
remained stuck in the mud. This same confusion prevailed in all the
departments. We shall take the liberty here to quote at some length from
the remarks of the Prince De Joinville, who was at that time a member of
General McClellan's staff, an able soldier and an ardent friend of the
Commander-in-Chief. Says the Prince:
"The American system of 'every man for himself,' individually
applied by officers and soldiers of each corps to one another,
is also applied by the corps themselves to their reciprocal
relations. There is no special branch of the service whose duty
it is to regulate, centralize and direct the movements of the
army. In such a case as this of which we are speaking, we should
have seen the general staff of a French army taking care that
nothing should impede the advance of the troops; stopping a file
of wagons here and ordering it out of the road to clear the way;
sending on a detail of men there to repair the roadway, or draw
a cannon out of the mud in order to communicate to every corps
commander the orders of the general-in-chief. Here nothing of
the sort is done.
"The want of a general staff was not less severely felt in
obtaining and transmitting the information necessary, at the
moment of an impending action. No one knew the country; the maps
were so defective that they were useless. Little was known about
the fortified battle-field on which the army was about to be
engaged. Yet this battle-field had been seen and reconnoitered
by the troops which had taken part in Stoneman's skirmish.
Enough was surely known of it for us to combine a plan of
attack, and assign to every commander his own part of the work.
No, this was not so. Every one kept his observations to himself;
not from any ill-will, but because it was nobody's special duty
to do this general work. It was a defect in the organization,
and with the best elements in the world, an army that is not
organized cannot expect great success. It is fortunate if it
escapes disaster."
We may be pardoned for continuing this digression from the narrative, to
speak particularly of the disorder in the medical department. The
surgeons of regiments were, as a general rule, men of ability, and who
were earnestly devoted to the duties of their position. Of course, in so
large an army, there were some who were not fitted for their position,
either by ability or moral worth; these were exceptions. Yet, while
there was a general disposition prevailing in the department to make any
sacrifice or submit to any amount of fatigue, in order to relieve the
sufferings of those committed to their charge, they labored under the
greatest disadvantage from want of proper combination and coöperation in
the staff. Every man was for himself. Each regimental surgeon was
expected to look out for the wants of his own men; to erect his hospital
tents; to see that the wounded of his regiment were carried off the
field; to administer food, dress wounds, and attend to the operative
surgery. With all these divers cares, he could hardly be expected to
perform any duties well. When any combination of action was effected,
the organization was voluntary and temporary, and, of course, wanting in
order and efficiency. Added to these difficulties, the medical officer
found himself destitute of supplies, and seemingly without any prospect
of obtaining them.
It is true that the officers of the medical staff were generally
inexperienced in the duties of military surgery, so different from the
labors of the physician in civil life; yet, the great trouble was
without doubt at head-quarters. The department was directed by an
officer who had done good service in the Mexican war, but who by long
connection with the regular army, seemed to have become so wedded to the
formal precision of military routine, that no contingency was sufficient
to move him from his established habits. Here was occasion for
dispensing with formalities. Responsibilities should have been assumed,
and, if necessary, supplies should have been thrown into the army
broadcast, without thought of requisition or receipts. Under the
direction of the efficient and gentlemanly surgeon of volunteers, Dr.
Letterman, order was at length brought out of the confusion which
existed until the battle of Antietam; from which time the medical staff
became the most efficient ever known in any army.
To return to our narrative. By noon the battle raged furiously; Hooker's
division contesting the field nobly against superior numbers, while our
own division held the position on his right, but without coming to any
direct engagement aside from being subjected to the fire of artillery.
Hooker brought his men gallantly up to the work and at first forced the
enemy back, but in turn was driven from the ground he had taken, and
only by the most valorous fighting, prevented a rout.
The gallant general and his noble men held the ground alone until the
division was fearfully cut up. At length General Kearney, at the head of
his division, approached on the Lee's Mills road. General Sumner rode up
to him and said quietly, "General, do you know that Hooker is badly cut
up?" "No." "He is, and is falling back. Hurry on your division as fast
as possible." "How shall I reach him?" said Kearney. "Through yonder
strip of woods." Kearney now led his men forward at a rapid pace and
very soon came to the relief of the exhausted division. The troops of
Hooker were holding their ground against the enemy twenty thousand
strong. They had fought for hours with only nine thousand men.
General Hancock of our First brigade, at his own and General Smith's
request, was, at three o'clock, allowed to take his own and a part of
our Third brigade to the right of the line, where the position of the
enemy was very strong by nature, and which was on that account secured
with less care than the rest of the line.
A steep wooded bluff rose to a great height in our front, and a mill
pond lying at the foot of the bluff and newly dammed by the rebels,
served as a moat. Spanning the pond near the dam, was a bridge of logs
which they had neglected to destroy. Across this bridge and up a road
winding along the side of the bluff, the general led his troops, finding
the enemy upon the plateau above, occupying strong redoubts. Artillery
was brought to bear upon them and the rebels fled; our forces advancing
and occupying the works. The enemy was now reinforced by a brigade of
North Carolina troops and charged upon the federals. The Union troops
allowed them to approach very near, when they opened a tremendous fire
of musketry and artillery upon them. Still the rebels came on until they
were within thirty yards of our men. "Now, gentlemen, the bayonet!"
cried Hancock, as he rode along the line of battle close to the troops.
The men charged upon the rebels, who fell back before the shock, broke
and fled, leaving the broad, green wheat field strewed with their dead
and wounded.
[Illustration: CHARGE OF HANCOCK'S BRIGADE AT WILLIAMSBURGH]
While the fighting was going on, General Hancock had sent for the
remainder of our Third brigade. The order "forward, double quick" was
received by the men with one of those wild exulting shouts, such as is
only heard on the field of battle; and they rushed forward through the
liquid mud, each regiment striving which should first reach the field.
But as we reached the scene of conflict, the rebels had fled; leaving
the victory with the men in blue.
The regiments engaged in this brilliant affair were, the Forty-third New
York, the Forty-ninth Pennsylvania, the Sixth Maine and Fifth Wisconsin,
of the First brigade, and the Thirty-third New York and Seventh Maine of
the Third brigade.
The rebels, outflanked by the gallant movement of Smith's division, were
glad to fall back from before Hooker and Kearney, and seek refuge behind
their works. Meanwhile the great body of the army had remained entirely
passive; not even having been brought into line of battle. Why some of
these troops were not called to the assistance of Hooker, or to render
the victory of Hancock more complete, we do not know.
Thus closed the battle of Williamsburgh; a battle fought by two
divisions and a part of a third, while the mass of the army remained as
idle spectators of the terrible scene. If less than twenty thousand men
could drive the rebels from their strong works, what could not that
grand army have done had it been brought into action!
General McClellan arrived on the field at five o'clock in the afternoon,
and was received with shouts of applause; but the fighting was then
over. The general had remained at Yorktown since the morning of the 4th,
to superintend personally the shipment of Franklin's division of twelve
thousand men; one-half of whom, in order that they might be in readiness
at any moment to proceed up the river and head off the enemy, had never
been allowed to disembark from the transports which brought them to
Yorktown. General McClellan's conduct in spending nearly two days in
overseeing personally the embarkation of half or even the whole of a
division of men, while one of the most important battles of the war was
in progress, leaving it to others to take care of the "little affair at
the front," has, by some, been severely censured; while others have as
earnestly claimed that the Commander-in-Chief had his own views of the
necessity of getting those troops off at once, and the necessity of
seeing that supplies of rations, ammunition and war material, were
forwarded, was imperative; and that we are to remember that the advance
was intrusted to General Sumner; a man in whose ability both he and the
army confided. The general telegraphed that night to the Secretary of
War: "After arranging for movements up the York river, I was sent for
here. I find General Joe Johnston in front of me in strong force,
probably greater a good deal than my own.... My entire force is
_undoubtedly considerably inferior to that of the rebels_, who will
fight well; but I will do all I can with the force at my disposal."
It was not known that night that we had won such a victory; but when, in
the morning, we found the rebels all gone, he telegraphed: "Every hour
proves our victory more complete."
In the light of this testimony of the Commander-in-Chief, what a noble
record had those three divisions that day made for themselves! They had,
according to these dispatches, fought with a force "greater a good deal"
than our entire army, and had won a complete victory!
Night closed upon the battle-field. Our division bivouacked around one
of the rebel redoubts. It was filled with rebel wounded, whose groans
and cries made the night hideous. The ground was a bed of liquid mud,
and the rain still poured. No fires were allowed, and the men stood
shivering all night rather than lie down in the mud.
The sun rose clear and bright next morning, and the whole army filed
into the works deserted by the enemy during the night, and occupied the
town of Williamsburgh, a mile or more from the battle-field. All the
public buildings in town were filled with the rebel wounded; and the
inhabitants were actively engaged in ministering to their wants. Here
the army remained three days, waiting for provisions to come up from
Yorktown, a distance of fifteen miles. It is a question, why troops, who
were afterward accustomed to carry four or even six days' rations, were
sent away from Yorktown with one.