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Show EXERCISE OVER United States Marines Execute Strategic 1 c Movements in the Wilderness and RSLU HfciLDb Ur Spotsylvania Where Great Battles of CIVIL STRIFE e CiviI War Were DecIded- Veterans of " 61'' telling the Leath. ernecks how they "did It" over the same ground. t . ...v .;.;-,N.ws;'?'. rr: :';r W "v ! I i I W.,.Uv.V.W.V.V. ..V.V.V.V.V.W,,,,,,,,,, Jp-'V. "T, ''.Ar i Veterans of " -61" telling the Leath. ... - T- vf J. ..,..'.-,"-"".""' '- . ! erne.k, how they "d,d It- over the N f ft& ? ' same flround. ' I lV ' , I V o vN v.v . V-V Veteran of '"61" exP,alninfl t0 - I O t , NN 4-v n , Interested group of United States ma- Y v "'.ji A 4 VI rlnes the manner In which General Lee K , V s - A, - 1 fought against Hooker In the batt e of UVN- - xvV I -s ,X X "r Chancellorsvillo In the Civil war, Wll- ; ' N . Nw " x derness Run being General Leo's line SVOS- - V s ) 1 ' f ! I '.'I of defense, l c - t..l s ' i Jf I-'.. ; . 4 it v ' .1 Jt i ' 4 ! t ' 'v v k E. M. Jackson of Randall's battalion : k. f . i 1 ''J - j s 1 f ' i pointing out to General Lejeune where . j' f K ... 4 W-""'1' ' ': ' I ' i he and his comrades came over the V " s .1 I t ' J 1 topln'61- . V "rvV 1 v J i 'i "tt ' v v ' ' r -'V x7" v E. M. Jackson of Randall's battalion pointing out to General Lejeune where he and his comrades came over the top in '61. LAST September United States ma-1 rimes mareheti, skirmished, formed lines of battle, took up and abandoned aban-doned positions, executed strategic movements, and made charges on the historic fields of the Wilderness and Spottsylvania. The pop and whiz of Springfield fire, the rip-rip of machine guns, the smash of field pieces and the crash of shell and bomb sounded through the shadowy woods, close tangles and across rolling, hilly fields near the Chancellor house. Wilderness Wilder-ness church, Wilderness tavern, Parker's Park-er's etore. Dodd's tavern. Alsop's farm, and Bloody Angle, and along the Fredericksburg and Orange turnpike, the Plank road, the Brock road, and the banks of the Rap'.dan, and the smaller rivers, Ny and Po. Here on one of the bloodiest and ghostiiest areas of the American Civil war the marines held maneuvers. Four days were spent in the vicinity of Wilderness Wilder-ness run, and those days were devoted devot-ed to battle exercises and problems. Where Stonewall Jackson Fell. Three miles west of the western limit of Fredericksburg is Salem church. Five miles west of Salem church Is Chancellorsville. One mile west of Chancellorsville is a little monument in the woods bv the road side which marks where Stonewall Jackson received the wound from which he died in a plain little farmhouse farm-house near Guinea station, 11 miles south of Fredericksburg. One mile west of the solemn little monument In its lonely site is Wilderness church. About two miles northwest ot the courthouse is a battle area once so strewn with dead and so littered with wounded men that for 50 years it has been called Bloody Angle, and that name will never be effaced from the tragic ground. Something more than a mile from Bloody Angle, at the fork of two old roads that are full of steep and bumpy hills and closely bordered by thick woods, is a monument that marks where General Sedgwick Maj. Gen. John Sedgwick, United States Volunteers, commanding the Sisth Army corps a corps commander under un-der Grant, was killed in action on the morning of May 9, 1SG4. This description points out some of the landmarks, some of the "high spots." as It were, of a section of that country In which the battle of Fredericksburg Fred-ericksburg was fought In December. lSf.2. In which the battles of Chancellorsville Chancel-lorsville and Salem Church were fought In May, 1803. and in which the battles of the Wilderness ami Spottsylvania Spott-sylvania Courthouse were fought in May, 1S&J a little patch of country that has been appropriately called "the cockpit of America." Still the Wilderness. If there are such wings as ghosts there must he armies of them in this tangle-land, for many, many thousands of young men vho wore the blue and many, many thousands of other young men who wore the gray were shot and bayoneted ro death in this wild country. Much of that country west of Chancellorsville and northwest of Spottsylvania Courthouse, which was called the Wilderness before and during dur-ing the Civil war, is still "the wilderness." wilder-ness." The winter of 1SG3-04 was one of great hardship and privation for the Confederate Army of Northern Virginia, Vir-ginia, as well as for other Confederate Confeder-ate armies. The winter of 1S6-MV was a Valley Forge winter for the southern south-ern troops. Gen. E. M. Law. C. S. A., irtiting of the Wilderness and Spott- sylvania battles, said: "The Army of Northern Virginia had gained little in numbers during the winter (lSoo-04) (lSoo-04) and had never been so scantily fed and clothed. Equipment as to arms was good, but commissary and quartermaster supplies were scarce and poor." He says that nearly all the soldiers were ragged, barefooted and half-starred, "but the morale of the army was high and Grant knew that It was still a dangerous foe In battle.-" Grant's plan of campaign was to put all the armies of the Union, east and west, into offensive operations at one time. He brought together scattered scat-tered commands and built up the Army of the Potomac to a strength which he believed would overwhelm Lee, who faced him across the Pu'.p-Idan Pu'.p-Idan astride the Orange and Alexandria Alexan-dria railroad and maintained touch with the Richmond and Fredericksburg Fredericks-burg railroad 3o miles to the east. Victory Long in Balance. The fighting spread along a front of four or five miles. One side drove the other back, and thea was driven back. Hancock's corps was driving Hill's fast. Gregg's Texans, only SOd strong, rushed against Webb's brigadt tp tt i ninpl..' enrna ln:t hnlf rhplt men in killed and wounded, but checked the Union advance in that part of the line, and Longstreet's corps, with Kershaw's division leading, lead-ing, was coming Into line. Long-street Long-street sent Mahone with several brigades brig-ades brigades were pititfully small then around the Federal left, which had advanced far west of the Brock road, on which It had been marching south from Germanna ford. Mahone brought his men at right angles to the advancing federal left, attacked It, and It shriveled back to the Brock road. There In the Wilderness the land and dotted with dead. Lee's plan ha.d succeeded In part, failed In part. He had inflicted on Grant much heavier losses than he had sustained, but he had not hurled the Army of the Potomac Into confusion con-fusion and disorder. Gallant Sedgwick's Death. On May 8 Sedgwick and Warren's War-ren's corps were thrown against Anderson An-derson and Early, and thrown back with heavy loss. The day of the 9th was spent In reconnoitering, Intrenching, Intrench-ing, sniping, sharpshooting and small firing here and there along the lines . as marching bodies became exposed wirhin range. On the morning of tht 9th Sedgwick was killed by a Confederate Confed-erate sharpshooter. The hall struck him in the left cheek beneath the eye. He had gone to an exposed part of the line. Shots were coming over now and then. He was warned. "Why," he answered, "they could not hit an elephant at that distance." He fell dead a minute later. The Confederate lines were very Irregular, adopting themselves to the broken contour of the land. At the north end of the position, two ndles above the courthouse, was a salient that bulged northward for nearly a mile, and in places was half a mile across. From the east base of that salient the Confederate line ran three miles sou;h to some high land above the Po river, a quarter of a mile east of Snells bridge. The "Bloody Angle." It was that salient which Grant picked as the place to break Lee's line and perhaps smash the army, and that salient came to be called "Bloody Angle." That point of the line was at- Veteran of "'61" explaining to an Interested group of United States marines ma-rines the manner In which General Leo fought against Hooker In the batt:e of Chancellorsvillo In the Civil war, Wilderness Wil-derness Run being General Leo's line of defense- tacked in the morning of the 10th and the attack repulsed. Again, In the afternoon, the Union legions came at it, moving forward between the bodies of the men fallen in the morning. The Blue lines once more recoiled. News came to Lee that Hancock had crossed the Po near Shady Grove church and was passing to his rear. Mahone and Iltth's division moved fast, attacked ILt'Cock's rear division and drove HaLcock back. Again news came that Grant was preparing to make a southward rash to reach the North Anna river first. Lee ordered back much of tae artillery that defended the north salient and set the trains in motion. A false nlnrm. The salient v. as again threatened. The men near the top of It went out Into the field and brush before them and brought back muskets and cartridge cart-ridge boxes from the Union Jead. Of course they brought back all the food found In the haversacks. Coffee and sugar were priceless luxuries. Bread and bacon were worth risking life for. A pair of shoes from a dead man! Why, the dead man had no use for them and many a soldier In the Army of Northern Virginia had not had shoes on his feet since the Gettysburg campaign the year before ! These men bringing back Union muskets and am- i munition from Union dead loaded all the muskets and lay down with perhaps per-haps half a dozen by their side. There were no repeating rifles and not many i breech-loaders. Another attack on Bloody Angle was coming. The artillery artil-lery that had been withdrawn was ! ordered back, but the attack came too soon. Some guns got back, but not ; in time to help much in repelling the attack. There was all the Talor on both sides that man can put Into fighting. The line at one part of the salient was broken and Hancock's men held the ground. Hand-to-Hand Struggle. General Johnson, twenty guns and 2,500 men, nearly his whole division, were captured. Early's division came, forward and the Blues were driven back. Another part of the salient was assailed and the line broken. General Perrin was killed. General Daalel was killed. General Bamseur was wounded. Lee was sending all available avail-able troops and the Confederate line was partly restored and all gaps closed. That was the 12th of May. All day and far into the night the fighting went on. At one part and then at another part of the salient It was hand-to-hand fighting. The Confederates Con-federates constructed a shorter line in the rear of the salient and fell back to It on the 13th. Both armies had been marching and fighting since the 4th of May. There was a lull until the ISth. when two corps of Grant's army, the Second and Sixth, attacked again, but the Confederate line held and the attack cost Grant many men. On the 19th strange things were happening. Grant was starting south to get between Lee and Richmond. A' Confederate force moving around the Union right had got that Information, but it cost them about a thousand men in killed and wounded to learn it. Hancock was leading the way to the south and to Richmond. The North Anna river, fifteen miles south of Spottsylvania was thu immediate objective ob-jective of both armies. Spottsylvania war, left behind and the North Anna river. Cold Harbor. Bethesda church and then the Chick-hotulna Chick-hotulna came into the red light of th history of tle Civil war |