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Lee had placed his headquarters on Stuart’s Hill,
overlooking the Warrenton Turnpike [US 29] just to the south of the Brawner
farm. The two wings of his army were now stretched at an obtuse angle hinging
on the Brawner house, like a gigantic set of jaws ready to snap shut on the men
in blue in the middle.
The upper jaw was Jackson’s wing, positioned, though not
dug-in, behind the embankment of the Unfinished Railroad. Taliaferro’s
division, now led by Starke was Jackson’s right flank. Except for skirmishers,
the whole division was held several hundred yards behind the railroad
embankment, protected from Union artillery fire. Next in line was Ewell’s
division, under Lawton, with two brigades battling on the railroad embankment,
and three several hundred yards back in reserve. A.P. Hill’s massive Light
Division covered the left, with four brigades along the railroad all the way to
Sudley Church, and two in reserve.
The lower jaw was Longstreet’s wing. Hood’s division
straddled the Turnpike at the Brawner farm, with the independent brigade of
Shanks Evan as its reserve. The divisions of Kemper and Neighbor Jones extended
south to the Manassas-Gainesville Road [Wellington Road]. Wilcox’s division was
held as an army reserve, and Anderson’s was still a days’ march away. A brigade
of J.E.B. Stuart’s cavalry guarded either extreme of the army.
After six hours of the Union men throwing themselves
fruitlessly on Jackson’s wing, Lee wanted to use Longstreet’s fresh men to snap
the jaws shut. But Longstreet resisted launching the attack, telling Lee he had
no personal knowledge of the ground or the enemy’s positioning, and only basic
maps. Though impatient, Lee acknowledged the wisdom of Longstreet’s caution,
and gave him permission to scout. Recognizing his chief’s desire, Longstreet hurried
off, but gave orders for the bulk of his artillery to be concentrated at
Brawner’s Farm for maximum effect.
Groveton
East of Groveton on the Turnpike, Franz Sigel, the First
Corps (Army of Virginia) commander, had concentrated the bulk of his artillery,
in order to cover the retreat of Robert Milroy. Sigel was probably unaware that
the men at Brawner’s were now Longstreet’s and not Jackson’s. John Pope
definitely was.
The commander of the Union army had arrived at mid-day, and
then rode forward from his headquarters established on the reverse slope of
Dogan’s Ridge to discuss the situation with Sigel. Sigel described to Pope how
he had started Schenck’s division down the Turnpike, only to run into the
Confederates that had attacked McDowell’s men the night before, leading to
another conflict at the Brawner’s Farm. Meanwhile, he had sent Schurz’s
division up the Sudley Road, to get around the Confederates at Brawner’s, only
to find more Confederates.
Then Milroy, supposed to be supporting Schenck, had stirred
up a hornet’s nest at another point between Schneck’s trouble and Schurz’s.
Reynolds’ Pennsylvania Reserves from the still-absent Army of Virginia Third
Corps of McDowell had gone in to help Schenck, who had sent half his force to
help out Milroy. Kearny’s division from Heintzelman’s Army of the Potomac Third
Corps had arrived, but so far had been little help to Schurz. Reynolds and
Schenck had managed to extricate themselves from the fight at Brawner’s, and
Milroy appeared to have been rescued from his spot by the artillery
concentration, but Schurz was still in trouble. Could General Pope provide a
force to relieve Schurz exhausted men?
John Pope flatly denied the request. Schurz’s men were going
to have to keep on fighting, and what’s more they were to attack. Sigel had
ordered Schurz to counterattack in cooperation with Kearny just before Pope
arrived in order to buy breathing room so his men could be replaced by the
arriving reinforcements from Jesse Reno’s Ninth Corps. Both men parted, Sigel hating
Pope for his lack of feeling, and Pope hating Sigel for his incompetence.
The fact is Pope thought he saw an opportunity. Jackson had
been more of a fool than expected, and had stretched his entire force in a
vulnerable position, where Pope’s army now had localized superiority in
numbers. Pope would pour Heintzelman’s Third Corps men and Reno’s Ninth Corps
men against the railroad embankment, forcing Jackson to reinforce, while
McDowell’s Third Corps and Porter’s Fifth Corps would soon be in Gainesville,
and able to cut Jackson off from the rest of the Confederate army under
Longstreet. So it worked in Pope’s mind.
Northwest of Manassas Junction
The man in possession of the knowledge that Longstreet was
not, in fact, far off, but instead on the battlefield south of the Turnpike and
linked up with Jackson, was again lost in the woods. Irvin McDowell had decided
to march his Third Corps, Army of Virginia, back to Manassas Junction, then
north to the Turnpike to join up with its missing division on the Union left.
But to save time, McDowell had marched with one brigade down a country road
that he thought was a short-cut. Instead, he was lost in the same country he
had been forced to spend the night in while trying to take a different
short-cut.
Further up the Manassas-Gainesville Road [Wellington Road],
Fitz John Porter, commanding the Fifth Corps, had decided that the Confederates
were in front of him in force, probably the divisions of James Longstreet, as
McDowell’s intelligence report had indicated. Before he had gotten lost,
McDowell had denied a request from Porter to loan him one division
(King’s—having just gotten it back, McDowell sure wasn’t parting with it
voluntarily) to break through the Confederates in front of him.
At an impasse, facing an enemy of unknown strength, and on
unknown ground, Porter halted his column, and sent one brigade north along
Dawkin’s Branch to try to see if he could find a path to Sigel. Before leaving,
McDowell had suggested Porter remain where he was. Porter hadn’t liked the
idea, but now it seemed like wise counsel.
Not far away, with several of his best scouts, Jeb Stuart
looked down on Porter’s column and the dust being raised by McDowell and tried
to deduce what the massive Union force on the Manassas-Gainesville Road
[Wellington Road] was doing. He would keep watching, but first he would send a
messenger back to Lee at top-speed to let him know about this potential
problem.
Sudley Springs
Unaware that they were not about to be relieved after all, Carl
Schurz’s men charged the railroad embankment again. Major Blessing of the 74th
Pennsylvania of Schurz’s right brigade wrote:
Forming again in column for attack the regiment advanced in quick time toward the enemy, who gave way until he arrived at the other side of the railroad dam. Here [we were] again flanked by the enemy, and under a galling fire of grape-shot and canister, the regiment had to leave its position, which it did by making a flank movement to the left, forcing the enemy to withdraw from the woods.
The brigade had seized the railroad embankment, and it was
the Confederates that at last had to face the brutal fire from the superior
defensive position. Schurz sent for artillery, in order to sure-up the narrow
breakthrough, and desperately waited for Kearny’s division to begin attacking
to his right.
But Kearny’s attack did not come. Not only that, but he
withdrew the regiment that had covered the problematic gap between the two
brigades of Schurz’s division, leaving them again vulnerable to being split
down the middle. The brigade of Ninth Corps reinforcements that was supposed to
replace Kearny’s men never got within range of the main fight, though they were
close enough for the South Carolina sharpshooters to pick off their officers.
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