THE WAR CONTINUES.
A. D. 1862.
Amid the exultation that filled the hearts of the people of
North Carolina for the victories around Richmond, there was grief
in many families for heroes fallen in the discharge of duty.
Colonels Stokes, Meares, Campbell and C. C. Lee, like a great
host of their compatriots, were gone to come no more. It seemed
that the superior numbers and resources of the United States
forces were to prove powerless before the fiery onsets of the
Confederate troops.
2. In the month of August, 1862, Zebulon B. Vance, of Buncombe,
then Colonel of the Twenty-sixth Regiment, was chosen Governor of
North Carolina over William Johnston, of Charlotte, who had been
of late Commissary-General of the State. By an ordinance of the
Convention, Colonel Vance entered upon his duties as Chief-
Magistrate on September 8th, 1862. He was to evince great zeal
in the discharge of his official duties.
3. The first Maryland campaign, which occurred in the fall of the
year, was the next event of general interest. In the battles
fought in that memorable campaign the North Carolina regiments
won great reputation, but a terrible loss of life. General
Branch was killed and General Anderson received wounds at
Sharpsburg of which he soon died, and left grief in many hearts
for their untimely end. Colonel C. C. Tew also fell in the same
great battle, and increased the grief of his people at the loss
by the mystery of his fate. He disappeared amid the storm of
conflict, but exactly how and when was never known.
4. In North Carolina there had been comparative quiet through the
spring and summer months. The Federal garrisons at Plymouth and
New Bern were watched by small bodies of Confederates, but no
fighting occurred except in Plymouth, which town was taken and
held for a few hours by Colonel Martin, with the Seventeenth
Regiment, and then abandoned because of the Federal gun-boats.
5. On Blackwater River, just below Franklin, in Virginia, there
was a gallant conflict of a few cavalrymen under Lieutenant
Thomas Ruffin, of the Fourth Cavalry, and a Federal double-ender.
The crew were all driven from deck and the ship lay at the mercy
of the assailants until her consorts came up the stream from
below and shelled the victors from their prey.
6. By the 1st of December the Federal army, this time under
command of General Burnside, was confronting General Lee at
Fredericksburg, Virginia. On the 13th, Burns attempted to carry
our lines, but after repeated and desperate assaults and terrible
slaughter, withdrew his troops. It was this battle that Marye's
Heights won its bloody fame. The gallantry of the enemy,
especially of Meagher's Irish Brigade was magnificent.
7. Simultaneously with the attack of General Burnside of the army
of General Lee at Fredericksburg, the South Carolina Brigade of
General Evans, then stationed at Kinston, North Carolina, was
surprised to see a few mounted Federal soldiers make an attack
upon the position then held by them. The Federals were driven back
and pursued in the direction of New Bern. Suddenly the South
Carolinians found themselves confronted by more than twenty
thousand foes.
8. In the speedy retreat that ensued, General Evans was unable to
burn the bridges across the river, and effected escape with some
loss. He was, the next day, reinforced and awaited General
Foster's approach on the road leading to Goldsboro. But the
Federals were seeking to intervene between that place and the one
occupied by Evans. All Tuesday morning (December 16th) the
masses of the Union troops were seeking to cross Neuse River at
White Hall; they were bravely met there by General Beverly H.
Robinson who, with the Eleventh, Thirty-first, Fifty-ninth and
Sixty-third Regiments, and Battery B, Third North Carolina
Battalion, withstood all their attacks and inflicted severe loss
on the baffled invaders. The contest lasted for eight hours
during which General Foster persisted in his efforts to drive off
the Confederates, so that pontoons could be laid forming a bridge
across the stream, in place of the one burned the night before.
9. Failing to cross Neuse River at White Hall, General Foster
marched in the evening for Goldsboro, and, having reached the
bridge of the Wilmington & Weldon Railroad, succeeded in burning
it, in spite of the gallant efforts of General Clingman and his
brigade to prevent.
10. General Foster retired in great precipitation to New Bern,
and the burned bridge was his only trophy in an expedition which
seemed so threatening at its inception.
QUESTIONS.
1. What was the feeling concerning the victories around Richmond?
2. Who was chosen Governor in 1862? When did Colonel Vance enter
upon the duties of Chief-Magistrate?
3. What losses had North Carolina sustained in the battle of
Sharpsburg? What increased the grief of Colonel Tew's people?
4. What was the state of affairs in North Carolina during the
spring and summer of 1862?
5. Describe the engagement on Blackwater River?
6. Where was the Federal army confronting General Lee on December
1st? What occurred on the 13th?
7. Can you tell of the surprise at Kinston?
S. What was the further result of this affair?
9. What is said of the conclusion of this matter?
10. Where did General Foster go?