Makers and Romance of Alabama History

by B. F. Riley

While the raw volunteer troops were lying inactive at Pensacola, the authorities watching the drift of the initial events of the war, Colonel Rodes was daily drilling his troops, and gave them a pretty thorough taste of war, even in the camps. When later in the spring of 1861 his command was ordered to Virginia, it was believed by many competent officers that Colonel Rodes had the best drilled regiment in the army. So distinguished did the regiment become in army circles, that officers of other commands would attend on the drill of the Fifth Alabama regiment to witness the accuracy of its evolutions and to note the perfection of the condition of the accoutrements of each soldier. When the young troops had become inured to actual army life, and the habits of the soldier had become fixed by reason of time, the rigid and exacting commander was transformed into an object of admiration, and that which at first excited opposition was transmuted into popularity.

The regiment of which he was the colonel barely missed becoming engaged in the first battle of Manassas. The regiment, belonging to the command of Gen. Joseph E. Johnson, came upon the scene just after McDowell’s lines broke, and the flight to Washington began.

In October, 1861, Rodes was made a brigadier general. He was under fire at Williamsburg, but the battle of Seven Pines was the first in which the command was actually engaged. Here the estimation of the troops of their brilliant young commander was greatly heightened, as they were led by him in this series of bloody contests. In this battle, Rodes received a wound in his arm, but was able to lead his troops into the battles of Boonsboro and Sharpsburg. At Chancellorsville, one of the bloodiest of the war, Rodes was entrusted for the first time, with the command of a division, one of the three of Jackson’s corps.

The division of which he had command led the army in the assault on the enemy, and thrilling his troops with the cry, “Forward, men, over friend and foe!” they fought with unwonted valor. With an impetuosity rarely witnessed, the division commanded by Rodes swept like a wave on a stormy sea to the utter dismay of the enemy.

As is well known, both Generals Jackson and A. P. Hill were wounded during the night, and on the young commander was imposed the movement so auspiciously begun, which movement was checked only by the darkness of the night. General Rodes was preparing to renew the daring movement with the break of day, and would have done so, had not Gen. J. E. B. Stuart arrived to take command, in response to a message from Colonel Pendleton of the artillery.

On the arrival of Stuart, Rodes quietly yielded the command, under the impression that the superior officer could inspire more confidence in the troops. That General Rodes would have more successfully executed the original plans had he retained command, was the belief of not a few army officers. In view of his brilliant movements on the preceding day, confidence in him was well nigh supreme. As a result of his skill and courage on the field at Chancellorsville, Rodes was made a major general. Appearing before his old regiment, he made the fact known, and said: “The Fifth Alabama did it.” It proved as easy for him to command a division as it had previously been that of a regiment, as was shown in the battles of Gettysburg, the Wilderness, Spottsylvania and the second battle of Cold Harbor.

By this time, Rodes had become the idol of his troops, and his skill and fighting qualities were subjects of general comment throughout the army. So impressed was General Lee by his splendid charge at Gettysburg that he sent an officer to General Rodes to thank him and his gallant command for their conduct in that bloodiest battle of the Civil War.

On the retirement of Early’s corps from Maryland, Rodes was in position to inflict severe blows on the enemy at Castleman’s Ferry and Kernstown. At Winchester, he fought his last battle. His death was a calamity to the army. As General Early testifies in his history, “In the very moment of triumph and while conducting the attack with great gallantry and skill,” General Rodes was killed by the fragment of a shell striking near his ear. He survived the wound but a few hours.

On the night following the day in which he fell, many of the wounded of his command were huddled in a large warehouse near the scene of conflict. The groans of the suffering men filled the air, none of whom had heard of the fate of their loved commander. The wareroom was densely dark, to which was imparted additional horror by the piercing moans of the suffering. During the reign of terror, another ambulance train brought in a fresh supply of wounded from the field. Some one overheard the remark that General Rodes had been shot through the head on the battlefield and was dead. For an instant every voice was silent, and in another, men began to weep like babes, over the fall of their great and gallant general.

Rigid as General Rodes was, even sometimes to sternness, his troops almost worshipped him, and a sight of him invariably evoked cheers which were rarely given to any excepting to Lee and Jackson. In his work on the war, General Early says of Rodes, “He was a most accomplished, skillful and gallant officer upon whom I placed great reliance.”