CHAPTER V.

THE ADVANCE TO THE CHICKAHOMINY.

(From May 9th to June 1st, 1862.)

SCENE AT WEST POINT.-MARCH ON THE PAMUNKEY.-ASPECT OF THE COUNTRY.-SCRUPULOUS REGARD FOR PRIVATE PROPERTY.-ARRIVAL AT THE WHITE HOUSE.-RETREAT AND CONCENTRATION OF THE REBELS.-EXPOSURE OF WASHINGTON.-CAPTURE OF NORFOLK.-DESTRUCTION OF THE MERRIMAC.--ENCAMPMENT ON THE CHICKAHOMINY.

On Friday, the 9th of May, 1862, five days after the battle of Williamsburg, General McClellan's army arrived at West Point, and effected a junction with Franklin's division. The distance traversed was about twenty miles. The picturesque and animated spectacle presented at this point cannot be described or imagined. The placid waters of the York River, expanding into a wide bay where the floods of the Mattapony and the Pamunkey meet, exhibited a forest of transport ships, most of them steamers, with their trailing banners of black smoke. They were incessantly coming and going, and moving in all directions. Wharves were improvised. Thousands of active men, with songs and laughter, were disembarking their stores. The ring of the woodman's axe was heard everywhere in the forest, as trees were felled, and roads were constructed, for the passage of thousands of teams from the banks to the encampment. A canvas city for a hundred thousand inhabitants rose as by magic. Squadrons of horsemen swept the plain. Wagons and artillery trains were too numerous to be counted. Polished armor gleamed in the rays of the setting sun, and silken banners waved in the evening breeze, while exultant music filled the air from scores of military bands.

Slowly and cautiously the army continued its march along the south banks of the Pamunkey, accompanied by the immense flotilla of gunboats and barges, with all needful stores. Probably, never before, in the history of the world, was an army so liberally supplied. About twelve miles from West Point, at a place called White House, the railroad from West Point to Richmond crossed the Pamunkey. It was consequently intended to make White House the base of future operations, and the station for our military supplies. The march over these twelve miles, with all our baggage transported by water, and during which we encountered no enemy and no obstacle, occupied seven days-from the 9th to the 16th of May.

The Pamunkey is here a fine stream, winding through a splendid country, then fragrant with the bloom of flowers and arrayed in the luxuriant beauty of early spring. Green meadows were fringed by wooded hills, and the whole landscape presented an aspect of picturesque beauty

which charmed all eyes. Magnolias, jessamines, and blue lupines bloomed in profusion, while birds of every variety of song and plumage sported among the branches of the trees. As the troops sauntered gayly along, they occasionally passed a fine old mansion, European in its antique style of architecture, surrounded by its spacious garden and cultivated fields. These fields had been tilled for generations by negro laborers, whose wretched, windowless cabins were clustered in the rear. The aristocratic master was invariably in the rebel army. If not voluntarily, he was there by the force of a relentless conscription. *

Occasionally a gray-headed old man, surrounded by a group of females, appeared upon the verandah which is invariably attached to a Virginia mansion. By waving a white flag he supplicated protection. Groups of negroes gazed with astonishment and with scarcely répressed delight upon the brilliant pageant, which they all instinctively associated with their coming deliverance. Whenever a National officer approached the door of one of these mansions, he was received with civility. The most intense eagerness was manifested for news, as these victims of rebellion were shut out by the censorship of the rebel press from all knowledge, except that which the conspirators were willing to impart. Frequently all the whites had fled, and the negroes only were left behind.

The gunboats, steaming up the Pamunkey, kept a little in advance of the main body of the army, shelling any suspicious point. On the shore the engineers, with an escort of cavalry, led the advance, reconnoitring and preparing maps and charts. The army, with its vast train of wagons, followed.

The troops marched by brigades. Each brigade was followed by its baggage-wagons. Each wagon was drawn usually by six horses or mules. Thus the army stretched back to an almost measureless distance, exposed to sudden raids upon any portion of the line by an adventurous foe. The common soldiers, however, reposed unbounded confidence in their young Commander-in-Chief. Though their progress was very slow, six miles being the extreme limit of any day's march, with buoyant spirits and abundantly fed, they trudged merrily on, anticipating no disaster. Soon the effects of the unhealthy climate began to be seriously felt, and thousands were prostrate with fever. They were immediately removed to comfortable hospitals on board the transports. At the close of each day the encampment of white tents rose like a fairy vision on the green meadows. The head-quarters of the Commander-in-Chief occupied some central position,

* "The style of living of Virginians differed, as they were divided into the higher and lower classes. The latter were the 'mean whites,' who owned no slaves, and generally less than half a dozen acres of land. The log huts of this lower class are so poor, and so unusual at the North, that a just description will scarcely be believed. They were set about the country without reference either to beauty or convenience. They are built of round hewn timber, joined at the cor-” ners, with the chinks filled in with mortar or clay. Never more than one story high, that one is so low that a tall man has to stoop on entering the door. Some logs thrown across above, form the ceiling of the room and the floor of the loft, and a ladder of the rudest description, leading through a hatch, is the grand staircase. These huts have usually one room; a two-roomed hut is a rarity. Sometimes the ground is the floor, the poverty of the owner preventing the purchase of floor-boards. A large fireplace, built also of logs, and a log chimney, finish the building.”—Siege of Richmond, by Joel Parker, p. 165.

surrounded by the spacious tents of his brilliant staff. The telegraph wires followed the advance of the army, that information might be instantly communicated to the rear, and thence to Washington.

On the 16th the army reached White House. The respectable mansion which gives its name to the place was owned by General Lee, one of the chief officers of the rebel army. General McClellan, with his characteristic respect for the rights of private property, immediately stationed a guard around this mansion, it is said, not even allowing the men to draw water from its cool crystal well. As the water of that swampy region was proverbially bad, this was felt to be quite a hardship. Even General McClellan himself would not take the liberty to appropriate this commodious dwelling to his own use, but pitched his tent in a neighboring field. Many complained bitterly that the sick and the wounded were not permitted to enjoy the comforts of this home of a rebel, who was leading those forces which were throwing death into the patriot ranks. Speaking upon this subject the Prince de Joinville says:

"This respect for Southern property has been made a reproach to the General in Congress. The opinion of the army did not take this direction. It indorsed the delicate feelings of its leader. It was pushed so far that when a servant found, in an abandoned house, a basket of champagne, the General sent it back conspicuously the next day by an aide-de-camp. We may smile at this puritanical austerity, to which we are not accustomed in Europe. For my part, I admit that I admired it."

Such were the two sides to the question. It may safely be said that those sinking and dying, exposed to the hardships of the camp, did not smile in being excluded from these ceiled chambers, and in being deprived of those delicacies which no money could purchase from the rebels.

The Pamunkey is navigable as far as White House. Consequently we enjoyed two important lines of transportation-the river and the railroadfrom West Point to this spot. The railroad, passing over a plain with neither viaducts nor embankments, had not been injured by the rebels. They had, however, destroyed the bridge across the Pamunkey at White House. Though all the rolling stock had been run off, the National army had locomotives and cars on board its transports, and trains were soon passing. General McClellan, instead of rushing on towards Richmond, but about twenty-four miles distant, with characteristic caution encamped his army on a spacious plain at Cumberland, about three miles below White House. The afternoon and evening of the 16th were spent in pitching their tents and arranging their camp. The whole army of one hundred thousand men, with all its array of horses, wagons, and artillerytrains, were spread out upon that plain within a circuit of four miles. At the southeast there was an eminence commanding a view of the whole encampment. From that hill many sketches were taken, but none of them can convey an adequate impression of the grandeur of the scene. On the north was the river. The other three sides were surrounded with a fringe of forest. Thus the whole grand army was brought together in one mass, the magnificent marquees of the officers, and the more humble canvas

houses of the soldiers, occupying a space of about eighteen square miles. Such a scene was never witnessed before upon this continent.

While our army had been thus slowly advancing, the great body of the rebel army had fallen back undisturbed upon their intrenchments surrounding Richmond. Here they were concentrating a majestic force for a desperate resistance. For this purpose all minor objects were wisely abandoned. A levy en masse of all men capable of bearing arms was ordered by the leaders of the rebels. These recruits were rapidly drilled in camps of instruction, and then incorporated in the old regiments. Thus every hour added to the force and efficiency of the enemy; while the National troops, from sickness, and the necessary detachments of garrisons to guard important points, were continually losing. Thoughtful officers in the army, and considerate men all over the country, began to be very anxious. It was manifest to the most ordinary intelligence that unless a blow were speedily struck, impregnable defences would frown upon us. It was apprehended that we should soon be the assailed instead of the assailants, and that from behind the rebel redoubts an overpowering army would be hurled against our lines. Cavalry reconnoissances showed that the whole rebel force had passed the Chickahominy, and were awaiting our approach behind the intrenchments of Richmond.

A fortnight had been occupied in the march from Williamsburg to White House. General McClellan saw very clearly the perils which were beginning to thicken around him. As his constitutional caution would not permit him to risk a sudden and impetuous assault, he continued to send imploring cries to Washington for reënforcements. He entreated that General McDowell, who was then at Fredericksburg, sixty miles north of Richmond, might immediately be sent to him, and by water instead of by land. Notwithstanding the peril to which Washington would be exposed by the withdrawal of these troops, its only defenders, the President, at the time, seemed disposed to yield to the entreaty. He wrote on the 21st of May, closing his letter with the following words :—

"General McDowell can reach you by land sooner than he could get aboard of boats, if the boats were ready at Fredericksburg, unless his march shall be resisted, in which case the force resisting him will not be confronting you at Richmond. By land he will reach you in five days after starting, whereas, by water, he would not reach you in two weeks, judging by past experience. Franklin's single division did not reach you in ten days after I ordered it."

On the 25th of the month General McDowell was on the eve of leaving Fredericksburg to join General McClellan, when General "Stonewall" Jackson commenced an expedition down the Valley of the Shenandoah, menacing Washington. It consequently became necessary immediately to dispatch General McDowell, with General Fremont, from Western Virginia, to aid General Banks, who, with a very feeble force in the Valley of the Shenandoah, was exposed to annihilation from the overwhelming rush of his foes. The President immediately wrote to General McClellan stating the posture of affairs, and closed by saying:

"If McDowell's force was now beyond our reach we should be utterly

VOL. II.-5

hopeless. Apprehension of something like this, and no unwillingness to sustain you, has always been my reason for withholding McDowell's force from you. Please understand this, and do the best you can with the forces you now have."

Affairs being in this posture, it was manifestly impossible to spare a single man of those confessedly too few who had been left for the defence of Washington. The rebels would gladly allow our troops to march into Richmond, if, in exchange, they could take possession of the Capital of the United States. President Lincoln, feeling very anxious in view of the military prospects on the Peninsula, went down the Potomac to Fortress Monroe, accompanied by Secretaries Stanton and Chase. He found that General Wool, who was in command there, had for some months been impressed with the conviction that Norfolk could easily be taken, and that an expedition ought without delay to be sent against it. It had been ascertained on Thursday, May 8th, that the rebels were evacuating Norfolk, that they might hasten to the defence of Richmond, and that only a garrison of about three thousand men was left in the intrenchments. A pilot gave information that a landing could be effected about a mile below the Rip Raps, near Willoughby Point, from which place there was a good road to Norfolk. General Wool, with Secretary Chase and Colonel Cram, of the Engineers, crossed over to this shore, landed, and satisfied themselves that troops could easily be disembarked there. Their report satisfied the President and Secretary Stanton.

A half-dozen transports were speedily crowded with troops, and on Friday evening, May 9th, were started for the landing-place. It was a short passage. In the early dawn of the morning, the steamers were putting the men on shore by a bridge of boats. President Lincoln accompanied the expedition thus far, and it is said he was the first to land. The infantry were disembarked in the advance, and, without the loss of a moment of time, pressed forward on their march. It was a tedious tramp of eighteen miles to Norfolk, over burning sands, beneath a blazing sun. The troops, meeting with scarcely any opposition, at five o'clock reached an intrenched camp of the rebels, two miles outside of Norfolk. There were, however, no troops there. Marching rapidly through the abandoned works, they approached the town.

Here they were met by the Mayor, under a flag of truce, and the city was surrendered to General Wool. After a brief interview at the roadside, General Wool and Secretary Chase drove into the city with the Mayor, in his carriage, followed by the General's body-guard and the National troops. Thus ended this important day's work. At four o'clock in the afternoon of Friday, General Wool left Fortress Monroe, steamed down the bay to Willoughby Point, disembarked his troops, and marched eighteen miles; took Norfolk, returned to Fortress Monroe, and was in his own bed before midnight on Saturday. It was a brilliant moonlight night as the squadron steamed down the magnificent bay, and the scene is represented as wonderfully beautiful and imposing. The whole expedition consisted of six regiments of infantry, one battalion of mounted rifles, and one company of regular artillery-in all, less than six thousand men.