5. Banks might have been reinforced by Blenker, of whose whereabouts Jackson was uncertain.
6. Banks might have marched to join McDowell at Fredericksburg.
7. McClellan might have pressed Johnston so closely that a decisive battle could not have been long delayed.
8. McDowell might have marched on Richmond, intervening between the Valley army and the capital.
Such an array of possibilities would have justified a passive attitude on Elk Run. A calculation of the chances, however, showed Jackson that the dangers of action were illusory. “Never take counsel of your fears,” was a maxim often on his lips. Unlike many others, he first made up his mind what he wanted to do, and then, and not till then, did he consider what his opponents might do to thwart him. To seize the initiative was his chief preoccupation, and in this case it did not seem difficult to do so. He knew that Banks was unenterprising. It was improbable that McDowell would advance until McClellan was near Richmond, and McClellan was very slow. To prevent Frémont getting an inkling of his design in time to cross it was not impossible, and Lincoln’s anxiety for Washington might be relied on to keep Banks in the Valley.
It is true that Jackson’s force was very small. But the manifestation of military genius is not affected by numbers. The handling of masses is a mechanical art, of which knowledge and experience are the key; but it is the manner in which the grand principles of war are applied which marks the great leader, and these principles may be applied as resolutely and effectively with 10,000 men as with 100,000.
“In meditation,” says Bacon, “all dangers should be seen; in execution none, unless they are very formidable.” It was on this precept that Jackson acted. Not a single one of his manœuvres but was based on a close and judicial survey of the situation. Every risk was weighed. Nothing was left to chance. “There was never a commander,” says his chief of the staff, “whose foresight was more complete. Nothing emerged which had not been considered before in his mind; no possibility was overlooked; he was never surprised.”[[7]] The character of his opponent, the moral of the hostile troops, the nature of the ground, and the manner in which physical features could be turned to account, were all matters of the most careful consideration. He was a constant student of the map, and his topographical engineer was one of the most important officers on his staff. “It could readily be seen,” writes Major Hotchkiss, “that in the preparations he made for securing success he had fully in mind what Napoleon had done under similar circumstances; resembling Napoleon especially in this, that he was very particular in securing maps, and in acquiring topographical information. He furnished me with every facility that I desired for securing topographical information and for making maps, allowing me a complete transportation outfit for my exclusive use and sending men into the enemy’s country to procure copies of local maps when I expressed a desire to have them. I do not think he had an accurate knowledge of the Valley previous to the war. When I first reported to him for duty, at the beginning of March 1862, he told me that he wanted “a complete map of the entire Shenandoah Valley from Harper’s Ferry to Lexington, one showing every point of offence and defence,” and to that task I immediately addressed myself. As a rule he did not refer to maps in the field, making his study of them in advance. He undoubtedly had the power of retaining the topography of the country in his imagination. He had spent his youth among the mountains, where there were but few waggon roads but many bridle and foot paths. His early occupation made it necessary for him to become familiar with such intricate ways; and I think this had a very important bearing on his ability to promptly recognise the topographical features of the country, and to recall them whenever it became necessary to make use of them. He was quick in comprehending topographical features. I made it a point, nevertheless, to be always ready to give him a graphic representation of any particular point of the region where operations were going on, making a rapid sketch of the topography in his presence, and using different coloured pencils for greater clearness in the definition of surface features. The carefully prepared map generally had too many points of detail, and did not sufficiently emphasise features apparently insignificant, but from a military standpoint most important. I may add that Jackson not only studied the general maps of the country, but made a particular study of those of any district where he expected to march or fight, constantly using sketch maps made upon the ground to inform him as to portions of the field of operations that did not immediately come under his own observation. I often made rough sketches for him when on the march, or during engagements, in answer to his requests for information.”[[8]]
It is little wonder that it should have been said by his soldiers that “he knew every hole and corner of the Valley as if he had made it himself.”
But to give attention to topography was not all that Jackson had learned from Napoleon. “As a strategist,” says Dabney, “the first Napoleon was undoubtedly his model. He had studied his campaigns diligently, and he was accustomed to remark with enthusiasm upon the evidences of his genius. “Napoleon,” he said, “was the first to show what an army could be made to accomplish. He had shown what was the value of time as an element of strategic combination, and that good troops, if well cared for, could be made to march twenty-five miles daily, and win battles besides.” And he had learned more than this. “We must make this campaign,” he said at the beginning of 1868, “an exceedingly active one. Only thus can a weaker country cope with a stronger; it must make up in activity what it lacks in strength. A defensive campaign can only be made successful by taking the aggressive at the proper time. Napoleon never waited for his adversary to become fully prepared, but struck him the first blow.”
It would perhaps be difficult, in the writings of Napoleon, to find a passage which embodies his conception of war in terms as definite as these; but no words could convey it more clearly. It is sometimes forgotten that Napoleon was often outnumbered at the outset of a campaign. It was not only in the campaigns of Italy, of Leipsic, of 1814, and of Waterloo, that the hostile armies were larger than his own. In those of Ulm, Austerlitz, Eckmühl, and Dresden, he was numerically inferior on the whole theatre of war; but while the French troops were concentrated under a single chief, the armies of the Allies were scattered over a wide area, and unable to support each other. Before they could come together, Napoleon, moving with the utmost rapidity, struck the first blow, and they were defeated in succession. The first principle of war is to concentrate superior force at the decisive point, that is, upon the field of battle. But it is exceedingly seldom that by standing still, and leaving the initiative to the enemy, that this principle can be observed, for a numerically inferior force, if it once permits its enemy to concentrate, can hardly hope for success. True generalship is, therefore, “to make up in activity for lack of strength; to strike the enemy in detail, and overthrow his columns in succession. And the highest art of all is to compel him to disperse his army, and then to concentrate superior force against each fraction in turn.