AN UNREALIZED OPPORTUNITY
Here might have been won a Federal victory that would have precluded defeat at Second Bull Run. The corps of General Heintzelman, consisting of the divisions of Hooker and Kearny, was the next detachment of McClellan’s forces to arrive to the aid of Pope. On the 28th of August, Heintzelman had pushed forward to Centreville, entering it soon after “Stonewall” Jackson’s rear-guard had retired. Instead of pursuing, Heintzelman drew up his forces east of Cub Run, which we see in the picture. Jackson’s forces, now in a precarious position, fell back toward Thoroughfare Gap to form a junction with Longstreet’s Corps, which Lee had sent forward. The battle was commenced on the west somewhat feebly by Generals McDowell and Sigel. By nightfall the Confederate left had been driven back fully a mile.
COPYRIGHT, 1911, PATRIOT PUB. CO.
MAJOR-GENERAL SAMUEL P. HEINTZELMAN AND STAFF
THE TWICE WON FIELD
Sleeping on their arms on the night of August 29th, the Federal veterans were as confident of having won a victory as were the raw troops in the beginning of the first battle of Bull Run. But the next day’s fighting was to tell the tale. General Ewell had been wounded in the knee by a minie ball in the severe fight at Groveton and was unable to lead his command; but for the impetuosity of this commander was substituted that of Longstreet, nicknamed “the War-Horse,” whose arrival in the midst of the previous day’s engagement had cost the Federals dear. On the morning of the second day Longstreet’s batteries opened the engagement. When the general advance came, as the sun shone on the parallel lines of glittering bayonets, it was Longstreet’s men bringing their muskets to “the ready” who first opened fire with a long flash of flame. It was they who pressed most eagerly forward and, in the face of the Federal batteries, fell upon the troops of General McDowell at the left and drove them irresistibly back. Although the right Federal wing, in command of General Heintzelman, had not given an inch, it was this turning of the left by Longstreet which put the whole Federal army in retreat, driving them across Bull Run. The Confederates were left in possession of the field, where lay thousands of Federal dead and wounded, and Lee was free to advance his victorious troops into the North unmolested.