General Meade had, indeed, resolved that the year should not end without another blow at his adversary, and the brief campaign, known as the "Advance to Mine Run," followed. It was the least favorable of all seasons for active operations; but the Federal commander is vindicated from the charge of bad soldiership by two circumstances which very properly had great weight with him. The first was, the extreme impatience of the Northern authorities and people at the small results of the bloody fighting of the year. Gettysburg had seemed to them a complete defeat of Lee, since he had retreated thereafter without loss of time to Virginia; and yet three months afterward the defeated commander had advanced upon and forced back his victorious adversary. That such should be the result of the year's campaigning seemed absurd to the North. A clamorous appeal was made to the authorities to order another advance; and this general sentiment is said to have been shared by General Meade, who had declared himself bitterly disappointed at missing a battle with Lee in October. A stronger argument in favor of active operations lay in the situation, at the moment, of the Southern army. Lee, anticipating no further fighting during the remainder of the year, opposed the enemy on the Rapidan with only one of his two corps—that of Ewell; while the other—that of Hill—was thrown back, in detached divisions, at various points on the Orange and the Virginia Central Railroads, for the purpose of subsistence during the winter. This fact, becoming known to General Meade, dictated, it is said, his plan of operations. An advance seemed to promise, from the position of the Southern forces, a decisive success. Ewell's right extended no farther than Morton's Ford, on the Rapidan, and thus the various fords down to Chancellorsville were open. If General Meade could cross suddenly, and by a rapid march interpose between Ewell and the scattered divisions of Hill far in rear, it appeared not unreasonable to conclude that Lee's army would be completely disrupted, and that the two corps, one after another, might be crushed by the Federal army.
This plan, which is given on the authority of Northern writers, exhibited good soldiership, and, if Lee were to be caught unawares, promised to succeed. Without further comment we shall now proceed to the narrative of this brief movement, which, indecisive as it was in its results, was not uninteresting, and may prove as attractive to the military student as other operations more imposing and accompanied by bloodier fighting.
General Meade began to move toward the Rapidan on November 26th, and every exertion was made by him to advance with such secrecy and rapidity as to give him the advantage of a surprise. In this, however, he was disappointed. No sooner had his orders been issued, and the correspondent movements begun, than the accomplished scouts of Stuart hurried across the Rapidan with the intelligence. Stuart, whose headquarters were in a hollow of the hills near Orange, and not far from General Lee's, promptly communicated in person to the commander-in-chief this important information, and Lee dispatched immediately an order to General A.P. Hill, in rear, to march at once and form a junction with Ewell in the vicinity of Verdierville. The latter officer was directed to retire from his advanced position upon the Rapidan, which exposed him to an attack on his right flank and rear, and to fall back and take post behind the small stream called Mine Run.
In following with a critical eye the operations of General Lee, the military student must be struck particularly by one circumstance, that in all his movements he seemed to proceed less according to the nice technicalities of the art of war, than in accordance with the dictates of a broad and comprehensive good sense. It may be said that, in choosing position, he always chose the right and never the wrong one; and the choice of Mine Run now as a defensive line was a proof of this. The run is a small water-course which, rising south of the great highway between Orange and Chancellorsville, flows due northward amid woods and between hills to the Rapidan, into which it empties itself a few miles above Germanna, General Meade's main place of crossing. This stream is the natural defence of the right flank of an army posted between Orange and the Rapidan. It is also the natural and obvious line upon which to receive the attack of a force marching from below toward Gordonsville. Behind Mine Run, therefore, just east of the little village of Verdierville, General Lee directed his two corps to concentrate; and at the word, the men, lounging but now carelessly in winter-quarters, sprung to arms, "fell in," and with burnished muskets took up the line of march.
We have spoken of the promptness with which the movement was made, and it may almost be said that General Meade had scarcely broken up his camps north of the Rapidan, when Lee was in motion to go and meet him. On the night of the 26th, Stuart, whose cavalry was posted opposite the lower fords, pushed forward in person, and bivouacked under some pines just below Verdierville; and before daylight General Lee was also in the saddle, and at sunrise had reached the same point. The night had been severely cold, for winter had set in in earnest; but General Lee, always robust and careless of weather, walked down, without wrapping, and wearing only his plain gray uniform, to Stuart's impromptu headquarters under the pines, where, beside a great fire, and without other covering than his army-blanket, the commander of the cavalry had slept since midnight.
As Lee approached, Stuart came forward, and Lee said, admiringly,
"What a hardy soldier!"
They consulted, Stuart walking back with General Lee, and receiving his orders. He then promptly mounted, and hastened to the front, where, taking command of his cavalry, he formed it in front of the advancing enemy, and with artillery and dismounted sharp-shooters, offered every possible impediment to their advance.
General Meade made the passage of the Rapidan without difficulty; and, as his expedition was unencumbered with wagons, advanced rapidly. The only serious obstruction to his march was made by Johnson's division of Ewell's corps, which had been thrown out beyond the run, toward the river. Upon this force the Federal Third Corps, under General French, suddenly blundered, by taking the wrong road, it is said, and an active engagement followed, which resulted in favor of the Southerners. The verdict of Lee's troops afterward was, that the enemy fought badly; but General French probably desired nothing better than to shake off this hornets'-nest into which he had stumbled, and to reach, in the time prescribed by General Meade, the point of Federal concentration near Robertson's Tavern.
Toward that point the Northern forces now converged from the various crossings of the river; and Stuart continued to reconnoitre and feel them along the entire front, fighting obstinately, and falling back only when compelled to do so. Every step was thus contested with sharp-shooters and the Horse-Artillery, from far below to above New-Hope Church. The Federal infantry, however, continued steadily to press forward, forcing back the cavalry, and on the 27th General Meade was in face of Mine Run.
Lee was ready. Hill had promptly marched, and his corps was coming into position on the right of Ewell. Receiving intelligence of the enemy's movement only upon the preceding day, Lee had seemed to move the divisions of Hill, far back toward Charlottesville, as by the wave of his hand. The army was concentrated; the line of defence occupied; and General Meade's attempt to surprise his adversary, by interposing between his widely-separated wings, had resulted in decisive failure. If he fought now, the battle must be one of army against army; and, what was worst of all, it was Lee who held all the advantages of position.