It can hardly be said, then, that the Confederates had drawn much profit from the invasion of Maryland. The capture of Harper’s Ferry made but small amends for the retreat into Virginia; and the stubborn endurance of Sharpsburg, however remarkable in the annals of war, had served no useful purpose beyond crippling for the time being the Federal army. The battle must be classed with Aspern and Talavera; Lee’s soldiers saved their honour, but no more. The facts were not to be disguised. The Confederates had missed their mark. Only a few hundred recruits had been raised in Maryland, and there had been no popular outbreak against the Union Government. The Union army had escaped defeat; Lincoln had been able to announce to the Northern people that Lee’s victorious career had at length been checked; and 12,000 veteran soldiers, the flower of the Southern army, had fallen in battle. Had General Longstreet’s advice been taken, and the troops withdrawn across the Potomac after the fall of Harper’s Ferry, this enormous loss, which the Confederacy could so ill afford, would certainly have been avoided. Yet Lee was not ill-satisfied with the results of the campaign, nor did Jackson doubt the wisdom of accepting battle on the Antietam.

The hazard was great, but the stake was greater. To achieve decisive success in war some risk must be run. “It is impossible,” says Moltke, “to forecast the result of a pitched battle;” but this is no reason that pitched battles, if there is a fair prospect of success, should be shirked. And in the Sharpsburg campaign the Confederates had undoubtedly fair prospects of success. If the lost order had not fallen into McClellan’s hands, Lee in all probability would have had ample time to select his battlefield and concentrate his army; there would have been no need of forced marches, and consequently much less straggling. Both Lee and Jackson counted on the caution of their opponent. Both were surprised by the unwonted vigour be displayed, especially at South Mountain and in the march to Sharpsburg. Such resolution in action, they were aware, was foreign to his nature. “I cannot understand this move of McClellan’s,” was Jackson’s remark, when it was reported that the Federal general had boldly advanced against the strong position on South Mountain. But neither Lee nor Jackson was aware that McClellan had exact information of their dispositions, and that the carelessness of a Confederate staff officer had done more for the Union than all the Northern scouts and spies in Maryland. Jackson had been disposed to leave a larger margin for accidents than his commander. He would have left Harper’s Ferry alone, and have fought the Federals in the mountains;[[37]] and he was probably right, for in the Gettysburg campaign of the following year, when Lee again crossed the Potomac, Harper’s Ferry was ignored, although occupied by a strong garrison, and neither in advance nor retreat were the Confederate communications troubled. But as to the wisdom of giving battle on the Antietam, after the fall of Harper’s Ferry, there was no divergence of opinion between Lee and his lieutenant. They had no reason to respect the Union army as a weapon of offence, and very great reason to believe that McClellan was incapable of wielding it. Their anticipations were well founded. The Federal attack was badly designed and badly executed. If it be compared with the German attack at Worth, the defects of McClellan, the defects of his subordinates, the want of sound training throughout the whole army, become at once apparent. On August 6, 1870, there was certainly, early in the day, much disjointed fighting, due in great part to the difficulties of the country, the absence of the Crown Prince, and the anxiety of the generals to render each other loyal support. But when once the Commander-in-Chief appeared upon the field, and, assuming direction of the battle, infused harmony into the operations, the strength and unity of the attack could hardly have been surpassed. Almost at the same moment 30,000 men were launched against McMahon’s front, 25,000 against his right, and 10,000 against his left. Every battalion within sound of the cannon participated in the forward movement; and numerous batteries, crossing the stream which corresponds with the Antietam, supported the infantry at the closest range. No general hesitated to act on his own responsibility. Everywhere there was co-operation, between infantry and artillery, between division and division, between army corps and army corps; and such co-operation, due to a sound system of command, is the characteristic mark of a well-trained army and a wise leader. At Sharpsburg, on the other hand, there was no combination whatever, and even the army corps commanders dared not act without specific orders. There was nothing like the close concert and the aggressive energy which had carried the Southerners to victory at Gaines’ Mill and the Second Manassas. The principle of mutual support was utterly ignored. The army corps attacked in succession and not simultaneously, and in succession they were defeated. McClellan fought three separate battles, from dawn to 10 a.m. against Lee’s left; from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. against his centre; from 1 to 4 p.m. against his right. The subordinate generals, although, with a few exceptions, they handled their commands skilfully, showed no initiative, and waited for orders instead of improving the opportunity. Only two-thirds of the army was engaged; 25,000 men hardly fired a shot, and from first to last there was not the slightest attempt at co-operation. McClellan was made aware by his signallers on the Red Hill of every movement that took place in his opponent’s lines, and yet he was unable to take advantage of Lee’s weakness. He had still to grasp the elementary rule that the combination of superior numbers and of all arms against a single point is necessary to win battles.

The Northern infantry, indeed, had not fought like troops who own their opponents as the better men. Rather had they displayed an elasticity of spirit unsuspected by their enemies; and the Confederate soldiers, who knew with what fierce courage the attack had been sustained, looked on the battle of Sharpsburg as the most splendid of their achievements. No small share of the glory fell to Jackson. Since the victory of Cedar Run, his fame, somewhat obscured by Frayser’s Farm and Malvern Hill, had increased by leaps and bounds, and the defence of the West Wood was classed with the march to Manassas Junction, the three days’ battle about Groveton, and the swift seizure of Harper’s Ferry. On October 2, Lee proposed to the President that the Army of Northern Virginia should be organised in two army corps, for the command of which he recommended Longstreet and Jackson. “My opinion,” wrote Lee, “of General Jackson has been greatly enhanced during this expedition. He is true, honest, and brave; has a single eye to the good of the service, and spares no exertion to accomplish his object.”[[38]] On October 11, Jackson received his promotion as Lieutenant-General, and was appointed to the Second Army Corps, consisting at that date of his own division, the Light Division, Ewell’s, and D. H. Hill’s, together with Colonel Brown’s battalion of artillery; a force of 1,917 officers, 25,000 men, and 126 guns.

Jackson does not appear to have been unduly elated by his promotion, for two days after his appointment he wrote to his wife that there was no position in the world equal to that of a minister of the Gospel, and his letter was principally concerned with the lessons he had learned from the sermon of the previous Sunday.[[39]]The soldiers of the Second Army Corps, however, did not allow him to forget his greatness. In their bivouacs by the clear waters of the Opequon, with abundance of supplies and with ample leisure for recuperation, the troops rapidly regained their strength and spirit. The reaction found vent in the most extravagant gaiety. No circumstance that promised entertainment was permitted to pass without attention, and the jest started at the expense of some unfortunate wight, conspicuous for peculiarity of dress or demeanour, was taken up by a hundred voices. None were spared. A trim staff officer was horrified at the irreverent reception of his nicely twisted moustache, as he heard from behind innumerable trees: “Take them mice out o’ your mouth! take ’em out—no use to say they ain’t there, see their tails hanging out! Another, sporting immense whiskers, was urged “to come out o’ that bunch of hair! I know you’re in there! I see your ears a-working!” So the soldiers chaffed the dandies, and the camp rang with laughter; fun and frolic were always in the air, and the fierce fighters of Sharpsburg behaved like schoolboys on a holiday. But when the general rode by the men remembered the victories they had won and to whom they owed them, the hardships they had endured, and who had shared them; and the appearance of “Little Sorrel” was the sure precursor of a scene of the wildest enthusiasm. The horse soon learned what the cheers implied, and directly they began he would break into a gallop, as if to carry his rider as quickly as possible through the embarrassing ordeal. But the soldiers were not to be deterred by their commander’s modesty, and whenever he was compelled to pass through the bivouacs the same tribute was so invariably offered that the sound of a distant cheer, rolling down the lines of the Second Army Corps, always evoked the exclamation: “Boys, look out! here comes old Stonewall or an old hare!” “These being the only individuals,” writes one of Jackson’s soldiers, “who never failed to bring down the whole house.”

Nothing could express more clearly the loyalty of the soldiers to their general than this quaint estimate of his popularity. The Anglo-Saxon is averse to the unrestrained display of personal affection; and when his natural reluctance is overborne by irrepressible emotion, he attempts to hide it by a jest. So Jackson’s veterans laughed at his peculiarities, at his dingy uniform, his battered cap, his respect for clergymen, his punctilious courtesy, and his blushes. They delighted in the phrase, when a distant yell was heard, “Here’s ‘Old Jack’ or a rabbit!” They delighted more in his confusion when he galloped through the shouting camp. “Here he comes,” they said, “we’ll make him take his hat off.” They invented strange fables of which he was the hero. “Stonewall died,” ran one of the most popular, “and two angels came down from heaven to take him back with them. They went to his tent. He was not there. They went to the hospital. He was not there. They went to the outposts. He was not there. They went to the prayer-meeting. He was not there. So they had to return without him; but when they reported that he had disappeared, they found that he had made a flank march and reached heaven before them.” Another was to the effect that whereas Moses took forty years to get the children of Israel through the wilderness, “‘Old Jack’ would have double-quicked them through in three days on half rations!”

But, nevertheless, beneath this affectation of hilarity lay a deep and passionate devotion; and two incidents which occurred at this time show the extent of this feeling, and at least one reason for its existence. “On October 8th,” writes Major Heros von Borcke, adjutant-general of the cavalry division, “I was honoured with the pleasing mission of presenting to Stonewall, as a slight token of Stuart’s high regard, a new uniform coat, which had just arrived from the hands of a Richmond tailor. Starting at once, I reached the simple tent of our great general just in time for dinner. I found him in his old weather-stained coat, from which all the buttons had been clipped by the fair hands of patriotic ladies, and which, from exposure to sun, rain, and powder-smoke, and by reason of many rents and patches, was in a very unseemly condition. When I had dispatched more important matters, I produced General Stuart’s present in all its magnificence of gilt buttons and sheeny facings and gold lace, and I was heartily amused at the modest confusion with which the hero of many battles regarded the fine uniform, scarcely daring to touch it, and at the quiet way in which at last he folded it up carefully and deposited it in his portmanteau, saying to me, “Give Stuart my best thanks, Major; the coat is much too handsome for me, but I shall take the best care of it, and shall prize it highly as a souvenir. And now let us have some dinner.” But I protested emphatically against the summary disposition of the matter of the coat, deeming my mission indeed but half executed, and remarked that Stuart would certainly ask how the coat fitted, and that I should take it as a personal favour if he would put it on. To this with a smile he readily assented, and having donned the garment, he escorted me outside the tent to the table where dinner had been served in the open air. The whole of the staff were in a perfect ecstasy at their chief’s brilliant appearance, and the old negro servant, who was bearing the roast turkey to the board, stopped in mid career with a most bewildered expression, and gazed in such wonderment at his master as if he had been transfigured before him. Meanwhile, the rumour of the change ran like electricity through the neighbouring camps, the soldiers came running by hundreds to the spot, desirous of seeing their beloved Stonewall in his new attire; and the first wearing of a new robe by Louis XIV, at whose morning toilette all the world was accustomed to assemble, never created half the excitement at Versailles that was roused in the woods of Virginia by the investment of Jackson in the new regulation uniform.”[[40]]

The second incident is less amusing, but was not less appreciated by the rank and file. Riding one morning near Front Royal, accompanied by his staff, Jackson was stopped by a countrywoman, with a chubby child on either side, who inquired anxiously for her son Johnnie, serving, she said, “in Captain Jackson’s company.” The general, with the deferential courtesy he never laid aside, introduced himself as her son’s commanding officer, but begged for further information as to his regiment. The good dame, however, whose interest in the war centred on one individual, appeared astonished that Captain Jackson “did not know her particular Johnnie,” and repeated her inquiries with such tearful emphasis that the young staff officers began to smile. Unfortunately for themselves, Jackson heard a titter, and turning on them with a scathing rebuke for their want of manners, he sent them off in different directions to discover Johnnie, giving them no rest until mother and son were brought together.

But if the soldiers loved Jackson for his simplicity, and respected him for his honesty, beyond and above was the sense of his strength and power, of his indomitable will, of the inflexibility of his justice, and of the unmeasured resources of his vigorous intellect. It is curious even after the long lapse of years to hear his veterans speak of their commander. Laughter mingles with tears; each has some droll anecdote to relate, each some instance of thoughtful sympathy or kindly deed; but it is still plain to be seen how they feared his displeasure, how hard they found his discipline, how conscious they were of their own mental inferiority. The mighty phantom of their lost leader still dominates their thoughts; just as in the battles of the Confederacy his earthly presentment dominated the will of the Second Army Corps. In the campaign which had driven the invaders from Virginia, and carried the Confederate colours to within sight of Washington, his men had found their master. They had forgotten how to criticise. His generals had learned to trust him. Success and adulation had not indeed made him more expansive. He was as reticent as ever, and his troops—the foot-cavalry as they were now called—were still marched to and fro without knowing why or whither. But men and officers, instead of grumbling when they were roused at untimely hours, or when their marches were prolonged, without apparent necessity, obeyed with alacrity, and amused themselves by wondering what new surprise the general was preparing. “Where are you going?” they were asked as they were turned out for an unexpected march: “We don’t know, but Old Jack does,” was the laughing reply. And they had learned something of his methods. They had discovered the value of time, of activity, of mystery, of resolution. They discussed his stratagems, gradually evolving, for they were by no means apparent at the time, the object and aim of his manœuvres; and the stirring verses, sung round every camp-fire, show that the soldiers not only grasped his principles of warfare, but that they knew right well to whom their victories were to be attributed.

STONEWALL JACKSON’S WAY
Come, stack arms, men, pile on the rails;
Stir up the camp-fires bright;
No matter if the canteen fails,
We’ll make a roaring night.
Here Shenandoah brawls along,
There lofty Blue Ridge echoes strong,
To swell the Brigade’s roaring song
Of Stonewall Jackson’s way.
We see him now—the old slouched hat,
Cocked o’er his eye askew;
The shrewd dry smile—the speech so pat,
So calm, so blunt, so true.
The “Blue-Light Elder” knows them well:
Says he, “That’s Banks—he’s fond of shell;
Lord save his soul! we’ll give him——” well,
That’s Stonewall Jackson’s way.
Silence! ground arms! kneel all! caps off!
Old Blue-Light’s going to pray;
Strangle the fool that dares to scoff!
Attention! it’s his way!
Appealing from his native sod,
In formá pauperis to God,
“Lay bare thine arm—stretch forth thy rod,
Amen!” That’s Stonewall’s way.

He’s in the saddle now! Fall in,
Steady, the whole Brigade!
Hill’s at the Ford, cut off!—we’ll win
His way out, ball and blade.
What matter if our shoes are worn?
What matter if our feet are torn?
Quick step! we’re with him before morn!
That’s Stonewall Jackson’s way.
The sun’s bright lances rout the mists
Of morning—and, by George!
There’s Longstreet struggling in the lists,
Hemmed in an ugly gorge.
Pope and his columns whipped before—
“Bayonets and grape!” hear Stonewall roar,
“Charge, Stuart! pay off Ashby’s score!”
That’s Stonewall Jackson’s way.
Ah! maiden, wait and watch and yearn
For news of Stonewall’s band;
Ah! widow, read with eyes that burn
The ring upon thy hand.
Ah! wife, sew on, pray on, hope on
Thy life shall not be all forlorn;
The foe had better ne’er been born
That gets in Stonewall’s way.