Christmas 1862 came and went with little notice by most of the regiment. Defeat at Fredericksburg had put many boys in a reflective mood. “Christmas was a lonesome day to me,”1 wrote Company B’s Hiram Stoddard. “I staid [sic] in my tent the most of the day and thought of the dear ones at home, but let us as the New Year is about to merge in upon us try to pray that it may bring with it glad tidings and the voice of freedom.”2
The regiment and brigade camped near Falmouth, Virginia, for the winter, their same camp prior to the mess at Fredericksburg. The boys endured as best they could the cold and inactivity. The men also endured the recent capture of the regimental sutler, which meant that small personal luxuries such as tobacco and writing paper were in short supply.3 Setbacks of the earlier campaign season had some beginning to question if it was all worth it. None questioned their ability to fight—they had casualties enough to prove it—but some wondered if their generals were up to the task or if the political winds were changing too much for their taste. Men had volunteered to defeat the traitors and restore the Union, but now it seemed the conflict was being turned into a war to free the slaves. Emerson Merrell described his feeling this way:
Soldiering is an old story—I am tired of the drum and fife and everything else pertaining to the soldiers life—we are not fighting for the union any more—it is merely a political strife, nigger or no nigger—but I hope that it will soon end for I consider the time that I serve a dead letter, lost to me intirely [sic], [I] shall forget all that I ever knew about civilized life. I can stand it another year if necessary but I had rather not.4
Others such as Pvt. Stoddard took the defeats in stride and tried to count his blessings as best he could:
Seeing it is the last Sabbath in the year 1862 & still I am a Soldier for Country … when I think what the Lord has brought me through for the past year I have to ask my self why is it I trust it is for some good purpass [sic]. Sometimes I get tired & impatient & almost discouraged but when I take second thought I feel as though I had no cause to complain as long as the Lord has been & still is so good to me. Oh when I think how many families the past year has left desolate of sons & fathers & yet your Children in the army are spared.5
But the work of war went on, despite how many families were left desolate. The Excelsiors had been without a proper commander since Sickles’ promotion. Colonel George Hall of the 71st N.Y. had been in temporary command since then and had led the boys at Fredericksburg. Now on Christmas Eve, General Joseph Warren Revere took over, though most of the boys probably didn’t notice. Chaplain Twichell wrote his father:
Gen. Revere has been assigned to this brigade. He took command yesterday relieving Col Hall who had been acting ever since we left Alexandria. The Col. started immediately for Washington and New York on leave of absence, for the purpose, it is supposed, of entering the list for a Brigadiership. I sincerely trust he will not succeed for he is not worthy of promotion…. I am sorry to say this but it is true.6
Revere was the 50-year-old grandson of Revolutionary war hero Paul Revere. He entered the navy at age 16 and served till resigning at age 38. Living in California for a time, he also served in the Mexican army as a colonel charged with organizing the artillery arm until returning to New Jersey in 1852. With war’s outbreak, Revere entered service as colonel of the Seventh New Jersey, part of Third Brigade, the New Jersey Blues. Revere rose to command of the Blues after the death of the ill-fated Francis Patterson.7
Christmas for many men was uneventful and melancholy, though it was a different story among the officers come New Year’s Day. Twichell related the evening’s festivities in a letter to his father:
At 3 o’clock the officers of the brigade met at the camp of the 1st Regt., and from thence, headed by Gen. Revere, proceeded to Headquarters of Division to visit Gen. Sickles. We found everything in real gala-day order. The wide street lying between the staff tents, which face each other, was spanned by arches of evergreens, adorned with appropriate devices, and all the place was gaily attired. At a short distance stands a small house. This was used as the eating and drinking rendezvous. On its piazza, a band of two violins, two flutes, an accordion, and a man who chirruped like a bird, discoursed sweet music and drowned the noise of mastication…. The programme was to first salute the General, then salute his victuals and drink.8
Soon the cheer of New Year’s was forgotten and the routines of camp life resumed. By January 13 Emerson Merrell had been made cook of Company I. Claiming no culinary abilities for the feeding of 50 men, the primary benefit of Emerson’s new post seemed to be that it excused him “from all other duty.”9
The attack at Fredericksburg a month earlier was an unqualified disaster for the Federal army, but Burnside wasn’t done; he still believed there was an opportunity to flank Lee and turn the tide of the war. Excelsior Brigade received orders on January 20 to move toward Bank’s Ford. Bank’s Ford was about four miles west of Falmouth and was in the left-rear flank of Lee’s army. The brigade moved only about two miles before stopping to let Franklin’s Grand Division pass. Instead of proceeding, the New Yorkers returned to their old camp in a heavy rain that continued all night. The next day the brigade moved again, going only about eight miles before camping for the night in the woods.10 While the Excelsior marched and countermarched, the army fared no better as it sat idle on the banks of the Rappahannock, waiting for pontoons that had been delayed by sluggish roads.
Trying to unstick themselves and the army, the Excelsiors were turned into road-gangs. All afternoon on the 22nd and next morning, the Excelsiors cut and laid logs, cobbling together corduroy roads that would enable artillery and wagon trains to pass.11 Burnside realized the endeavor was futile and returned his army to camp. Emerson Merrell summed up the rainy adventure this way: “Although we made an attempt to cross about five miles above Falmouth but it came on and rained for three days and we got stuck fast in the mud and wallered for two or three days and then backed out and gave up the chase.”12
Soon the three days of “wallering” became known as the “Mud March.” But even before this ordeal, some within the regiment had had enough of soldiering. Privates Thomas Roper and George W. Russell, both among those 112 recruits brought into the regiment who helped swell the ranks of Company C, were gone, deserted.13 Others deserted as well, but some, the officers, left for reasons of their own, and the complexion of the regiment had changed since those early days back in summer of ’61. Company C’s captain, Issac Chadwick, was out. Supposedly recovered from his wounding, the cold and strain of the campaign together with his recurring carditis and rheumatism rendered him “entirely unfit for duty.”14 He resigned on January 16. John Howard, who had led Company F since September, left the regiment on January 7, leaving the Newark Company in command of a Dunkirk man, William Post. Two second lieutenants, Warren Stanton (Co. H) and William McGinnis (Co. I), rounded out the wave of January resignations, both having received their commissions earlier that summer.15 Lt. Col. Austin was on leave again, home to recuperate from one of his varied chronic ailments, which affected his bladder and prostate among others.16 One man gone from the regiment but not from the army was David Parker. Before Fredericksburg, with the army’s reorganization, Parker remained detached to Hooker’s staff, working to improve mail service to the Center Grand Division.17 But the army’s biggest change was still to come.
There was no question Burnside was to be sacked after his short but disastrous tenure as army commander. But who would follow Burnside was not clear. Finally, after much debate within his inner circle, Lincoln decided to give command of the Army of the Potomac to Joseph Hooker. Hooker was a hard choice. A harsh critic of Burnside’s handling of matters, his name headed a list of generals whom Burnside wished removed from command, both for their criticism and for their hindering of operations by failing to fully carry out orders. Burnside presented his list to Lincoln with an ultimatum: either they go or he would. With no thought by Lincoln of retaining Burnside, the next question was who would replace him. Hooker’s name quickly percolated to the fore of potential replacements. He was a fighter, to be sure, and he had demonstrated abilities to command large bodies of troops, but the real question was whether his massive ego would get in the way. Lincoln and others knew this was not the kind of man expected to take orders from Washington, but they also recognized Hooker’s public appeal. Hooker disliked the “Fighting Joe” label, which nonetheless rang a true chord with the nation. “Hooker does talk badly; but the trouble is, he is stronger with the country today than any other man,”18 Lincoln conceded. Despite reservations, Lincoln gave Hooker command of the Army of the Potomac on January 26, penning perhaps the most reluctant presidential appointment letter in history. Lincoln penned:
There are some things in regard to which, I am not quite satisfied with you…. I think that during Gen. Burnside’s command of the Army, you have taken counsel of your ambition, and thwarted him as much as you could, in which you did a great wrong to the country, and to a most meritorious and honorable brother officer. I have heard, in such way as to believe it, of your recently saying that both the Army and the Government needed a Dictator. Of course it was not for this, but in spite of it, that I have given you command.19
The men of the 72nd trusted Hooker; he was a fighter and had led them to hard-earned glory at Williamsburg and elsewhere on the Peninsula. Many boys believed if earlier matters had been left to the likes of Hooker and Sickles, the army would be in Richmond with the war over. It was the higher-ups, Burnside and the rest back in Washington, who were the guilty ones. Some even pined for George McClellan. Certainly there was plenty of blame to heap on George McClellan, but many 72nd men were fond of their old general, and many held on to the notion of a Republican conspiracy, rather than inept generalship, behind his departure.
Back in Falmouth men hunkered down for winter. Stoddard, Merrell and the rest of the regiment, the brigade, and the whole army for that matter, built winter quarters. These were both of vital necessity and a point of personal pride. Messes of four or more men often combined their efforts toward the construction of dwellings that were water tight and spacious with a functioning fireplace-stove. Many were combination of log hut on bottom and tent canvas on top. All had chimneys, and those with stoves that could draw properly were particularly envied; their builder’s design services were sought by other messes. “I have got me a log house built with a fireplace in it. My bed is made out of pole with a little brush on them. I have three men with me now. The Col. told me I had got the best house yet,”20 boasted Hiram Stoddard. James Dean, who’d only been with Company C since the end of August, noted that the chore of building the quarters was made frustrating by the lack of proper tools. “We had been building little old shanties for 2 or three days which has kept us busy as we had only 4 or 6 axes to the company. I have a hatchet that I pulled out of a dead man’s knapsack on the battlefield and I would not part with it for any amount.”21
Winter quarters meant a time of routine. As the army settled in, Hooker immediately began granting furloughs to help build morale and curb desertions. The New Yorkers waited and wondered when their turn for some time home would come. Picket duty broke up the routine and the waiting while providing relief from the various fatigue duties of camp. Veteran troops like the Excelsiors looked forward to picket duty and the small amount of freedom it offered. The 72nd boys knew what the regulations forbade and also knew just how far they could push things. Conversations and even trade with their Rebel counterparts were outlawed but commonplace, as long as there were no officers about. Dean discovered that many of the Rebels bivouacked across the river were some of the same they’d leveled rifles at back on the Peninsula. Over the weeks they compared stories of the different battles and concluded the whole war could be resolved quicker if the privates and corporals could be left to settle the matter, leaving the generals out of it.22
On January 18 the paymaster arrived in camp, long anticipated. It had been months since the boys had been paid, and the paymaster’s coming was a welcomed sight. “We were paid 2 months pay yesterday and I have sent 25 dollars home by the express,”23 wrote James Dean to his parents, adding that collectively his company had sent more than $600 home. Emerson Merrell also sent money home, along with his picture: “There is an artist putting up a tent in our camp and I will have my likeness taken and send it to you.” He had been punished by the captain for disobeying orders, he added, “so I am no longer cook … but that don’t trouble me much for I can get along any way.”24
Winter camp’s boredom was broken on February 5 when the division packed up to support a cavalry reconnaissance up the Rappahannock. For three days the boys marched and camped in the snow and rain. After burning a bridge they returned to camp late in the afternoon on the 7th. Later that month, after days of cold and wet, on the night of the 21st orders came that the regiment would be deployed again. This time the brigade was going out on a heavy picket up the river. The next morning, with the regiments formed up behind rows of stacked muskets, men stomped their feet and rubbed numb hands in an effort to maintain circulation amidst the falling snow. Officers meandered through the ranks as men grumbled with wry dissatisfaction but little true anger. Captains and lieutenants no doubt felt the same but kept their comments private lest decorum not be maintained. Eventually the Excelsiors formed a long line of outposts along the Rappahannock. Fires were not permitted, and Colonel Stevens’ men endured eight inches of snow overnight, as they camped in small shelter tents, away from the comfort of their winter cabins.25 While on picket, both Yankee and Reb made concessions to the cold. “By mutual consent on both sides, the pickets do not fire on each other,” wrote Private Dean, adding, “The other morning when the relief came around, the Rebels presented arms to us and you would laugh to see them snowballing each other.”26 The expedition had left Sunday morning and by Wednesday had returned to camp with all now persuaded that “camp was a luxurious place.”27
Emerson Merrell’s patience with the war was growing thin. Despite two months’ pay, the war’s slow progress, the shifting political situation, and the camping in snow, all came to a frustrating conjunction in a February 21 letter to his parents:
We have some of the d d weather since I wrote last—it comes on and snowed last Tuesday all day and night and rained 24 hours without cessation so you can judge something near what kind of going we are blest with at present. All we have to do is cut wood enough to keep warm and a little camp dutys [sic]…. There is two men from the company absent on furloughs and their time is about up and when they get back two more will go and it may be such a thing as I shall be lucky enough to get one—old Joe is doing his best to gain the confidence of the soldiers which he will accomplish to some considerable extint [sic]—but he can never make them what they were when McClellan left them…. Old Abes proclaimation [sic] and Burnside together has made the army a regular gang of dead beasts.… There is 116,000 deserters from the army and a good many more that would cut the same paper if they dared—the people north are taught to believe that we are anxious to fight but it is a d d lie.28
William O. Stevens was the district attorney for Chautauqua County and a militia company commander at the outbreak of the war. Immediately recognized for his competency, Stevens was soon made the regiment’s major as the unit coalesced at Staten Island. Stevens eventually rose to the rank of colonel and was mortally wounded at Chancellorsville while maneuvering the regiment to face an enemy threat (courtesy the U.S. Army Heritage and Education Center).
One Company A man, George Bailey, saw Lincoln’s proclamation as a national double cross and took an almost sadistic glee in the plight of local blacks and what it might bode for the president:
Uncle Abes free Niggers are catching the very Devil this cold stormy weather. There are thousands of he and she niggers laying out on the ground without any thing to eat. Many of them are sick with the small pox and measles, dying by hundreds. Im glad of it dam em. They might stay with their masters but no, ise a free niggah sah, ise tastin de sweets ob liberty. These are dark days for old Virginia, the darkest She ever saw, and who knows how long it is going to last. My christian friend I can arise and say for one it will last as long as Abe Lincoln is president. The old fellow promised when he was on his Electioneering tour, that he would give us all a job, and well has he kept his word. Hes rightly called honest Abe for that if nothing else. But I am afraid the contract will run out before the job is finished.29
The camps had always been notorious for spreading disease. Men throughout the regiment continued to die; Charles Hoffman and Anthony Gardner, both of Company C, were among the more recent. But some sought to exploit their ailments and avoid the trials Emerson and the rest were enduring. “Dick [Richard Lindsey, Co. E] and I have made up our minds to dead beat it until warm weather comes and then we are ready to go to the regt.,”30 wrote George Bailey from his hospital bed in Washington:
Dick looks quite well now … but I don’t think they will ask him to do any more duty at the regt. if he goes back to it…. I could get mine [a discharge] but I am not able to do anything and I may as well stay here and do nothing for twelve Dollars a month as to come home and do nothing and have it cost me twelve Dollars a month.31
Early in March, Stevens sponsored a regimental shooting match. For a month prior, enlisted men of the 72nd engaged in the unusual practice of honing their marksmanship skills. With conventional army wisdom holding that target practice by men more accustomed to firing in massed ranks was a waste of ammunition, this was odd indeed. The competition was held on March 5. Regimental Chaplain Eastman, along with visiting chaplains O’Hagan and Twichell from the 74th and 71st N.Y., respectively, rounded out the umpiring corps. At 10 a.m. they began. Each man came to the line and fired three shots. The target was man-sized, six feet high by 22 inches wide, and was 200 yards distant. After each man fired, the judges took measure. As the competition wore on even General Sickles stopped by to take a shot, though there is no record of his particular results. By the time the 98 competitors had fired their combined 296 shots, only 76 bullets had struck the target and of those, only 22 were within ten inches of center. With judging complete, 23-year-old Pvt. John Bourne of Co. D was declared the winner. His shots averaged about 15 inches from center, earning him the $25 first place prize. Thirty-seven-year-old Pvt. Horace Wilcox of company E took the $15 second prize, while Emerson Merrell got $10 for third place, averaging 17 inches from center with his three shots.32 As for Stevens’ part in the contest, to Private Merrell’s satisfaction, “the colonel forked over the money as soon as it was desided.”33
Hooker had been charged by Lincoln to “go forward and give us victories,” and he planned to do just that, but the first thing needed was reorganizing the army in his own image. Among the changes, the most enduring Fighting Joe introduced was the instituting of identifying corps badges. Identification of troops in the field had always been a problem, especially when small units became separated from their brigades or divisions. Merely knowing your side from the enemy wasn’t good enough, and Hooker’s new system went a long way toward identifying the larger organizations and eliminating confusion. Each corps was assigned a particular shape, unique to them. The I Corps used a sphere, II Corps a trefoil, and the III Corps a lozenge (diamond) and so on. The badge color would denote a particular division: red First, white Second, blue Third and orange Fourth. These colored shapes were incorporated into flags and other unit insignia.34 Soldiers wore these distinctive badges on their uniforms, and soon the corps badges became a source of pride within the army. Shortly the Excelsiors were proudly wearing their white diamonds indicative of III Corps, Second Division. “Diamonds are trump”35 was soon a common phrase among these New Yorkers, adorning diaries and letters home.
To keep in touch with friends and family back home, soldiers relied on the mail. Anytime the army stopped for more than just a few hours or was hunkered down in camp, letter writing mushroomed. During the winter of ’62–‘63, James Dean wrote home frequently. On March 11, James wrote home to two of his younger siblings, David and Agnes, and gave his soldier’s perspective about camp routines:
I received your kind letter and am surprised to see the improvement in your letter writing, you have wrote me a better letter than I expected…. David how would you liked to be raised every morning at sunrise at the beating of the drum to answer at roll call. You then fold up your blanket and go down to the brook and take a wash. Come up and get your cup, go up to the cook house and get your coffee and 4 hard crackers and a piece of fat pork for your breakfast. You then go out on company drill from ten to eleven. You come in then you then have from then till dinner time to yourself then at three you go out on Battalion drill. Then we have evening Parade. Then we have to get our supper then we have to wait till Roll call at 9 o’clock P.M. You then go to bed as I would call it, liable to be called up at any moments. But I have got so used to it that every thing goes on like a well regulated clock.36
Emerson Merrill was of course a committed letter writer, but despite his placing in the shooting contest and the improving weather, his view of the national condition continued to be skeptical. By mid–March his tone to his mother reached sarcastic proportions:
I am well as usual and I am getting to be almost a sececk [psychic]. One glimpse at the past and the prospects of the future and what have we to encourage us [?] The prospects are now that Old Abe will issue a proclamation suspending the law of gravitation as that is the only law now left to us. In the mean time I will introduce a bill into Congress granting straight hair and white skin to all the negroes who take the Oath of Allegiance and Hickman has under contemplating, an act to provide for straight legs and shortning [sic] the heels of free Americans of African descents in order that they may line better in the ranks to soldiers…. In the mean time Senator Sumner will also introduce a measure that will astound the hole [sic] world. He has discovered that every rebel yet taken has been a white man and he has finaly [sic] come to the conclusion that white men and not slavery is the cause of the Rebellion. He proposes, therefore to pass an act declaring that black is the only loyal color and that no man can be an unconditional union man unless he adopts the loyal standard and blacks himself with ink and water. Evry [sic] man refusing this test of loyalty is to be arrested and fined $500 in greenback, to be laid out in Spelling books, Bibles and Black board for the contrabinds [sic]. If he is unrule [sic] and insists upon sticking the rebel color he is to be sent to Fort Lafauette and put on ration of salt junk and Pollywog water.37
Spring’s onset found Hooker and his men readying for a new offensive. Hooker’s basic plan was to bring Robert E. Lee to heel by maintaining a force in front of Fredericksburg while the bulk of his army moved northwest onto Lee’s left flank. There the army would cross the Rappahannock River and pass through the small Virginia crossroads known as Chancellorsville and ultimately on to Richmond. Private Dean made an uncanny prediction about the upcoming campaign in a March 30 letter home:
I do not think that we will attack the Heights of Fredrickburg [sic]. I think that we will cross in three places, he will cross on the right and left of their forces and flank them while he keeps a vigorous attack on their center, but there is no knowing what he will do.38
Hooker’s plan was set in motion during the last week of April 1863. By the 30th, the Army of the Potomac was on the move, with the various corps converging on Chancellorsville. Major John Leonard of the 72nd New York reported, “On April 28, in pursuance of orders, my command was marched to a point near the river, 3 or 4 miles below Fredericksburg.”39 The regiment continued moving throughout the next two days and by April 30 was encamped in the “immediate vicinity of the United States Ford.”40
Early on May 1 most of the army was across the river with XI Corps under Gen. Oliver O. Howard making up the Federal right, XII in the middle, V Corps and II Corps on the left, and III Corps in reserve still on the far side. Seventy-Second New York and the rest of the Excelsior Brigade finally crossed the United States Ford sometime around 11 a.m. “We crossed the river above Fredricksburg [sic], took the Hights [sic] & advanced some eight miles, we crossed the River on the first day of May, one of the prettiest days that ever shone,” wrote Hiram Stoddard.41
Hooker’s plan of attack had been working well. Federal forces had surprised Lee and enjoyed a sizeable numerical advantage as Confederate commanders groped for a solution. Both XII and V Corps had expanded their bridgeheads nicely and were in possession of advantageous ground. But when an expected counterattack by a Confederate division momentarily rocked part of V Corps, Hooker suddenly called a halt to the advance. He ordered corps commanders to assume a defensive posture by pulling back and consolidating positions. Corps commanders protested the order as unwarranted, given their good progress. Hooker now believed his road-bound troops would become isolated, unable to deploy properly if needed and subject to defeat in detail. Hooker told commanders not to worry, preferring to fight Lee on ground of his choosing and entice the Rebels to attack him.42 Years later, an aide would declare this was the moment the battle was lost.43
After crossing the river Colonel Stevens took his regiment and accompanied the rest of the brigade going south. About a mile later they stopped. Halted, many men made coffee and washed their faces and feet to seek relief from the overpowering heat. They resumed marching south, and by late afternoon the 72nd and the rest of III Corps were positioned to support the right of XII Corps engaged with Jackson’s Confederates.44
Both armies exchanged cannon shots throughout the evening and into the night. Seventy-Second men fired occasional volleys toward the enemy but to no real effect. In the darkness the regiment changed position and eventually the firing subsided, allowing those men in the regiment who could, to sleep. James Dean recalled the days’ events:
We then resumed our line of march till about 3 o’clock when we fired into some woods and the boys had begun to make themselves comfortable for the night when bang bang went the muskets of the pickets and the firing became hotter and hotter till whole volleys were given and then we lay on the ground and the artillery opened and whistled like a good fellow. Then came the word fall in boys, fall in, fall in quick we then marched up the road and then filed into the woods and some of the boys light fires without leave. And as soon as the rebs seen the smoke they commenced the throw shot and shell and you would laugh to see the boys kick out the fires one of the solid shot went clean through the haversack of the man on the left of the company next ours but did no more damage only to spill his coffee and sugar. Our guns then opened on the battery that kept annoying us and the third shot burst one of their caisons [sic] that is the box attached to the gun that holds the ammunition they then left us alone for a time.45
While Stevens’ men slept, Confederate General Lee held a counsel of war with his most trusted lieutenant, Thomas “Stonewall” Jackson. Lee knew he was badly outnumbered and in a difficult position. Only a bold, hard hit against the Yankees could turn things around, so he and Jackson set about formulating such a plan.
With dawn the next day, James Dean, Hiram Stoddard, and the rest of the regiment began building breastworks and cutting slashings in front of their lines. They were now positioned in reserve just south of Hooker’s headquarters.
Hooker knew the Confederate army to be mainly on his left, but throughout the morning of May 2 he received sporadic reports of enemy movements across his front and on toward his right. Hooker sent messages warning the XI Corps of the enemy movements. But what Howard did to prepare his corps for an attack remained unclear. Following a request by Sickles, Hooker now allowed two divisions from III Corps, the First under David Birney and the Third under Amiel Whipple, to move cautiously forward from the corps’ central position to see about intercepting some of those traversing enemy troops. This move now effectively extended the Federal line south. Sickles observed:
This continuous column—infantry, artillery, trains and ambulances—was observed for three hours moving apparently in a southerly direction…. The movement indicated a retreat on Gordonsville or an attack upon our right flank—or perhaps both…. The unbroken mass of forest on our right favored the concealment of the enemy’s real design.46
With Sickles’ First and Third divisions moved south, only the three brigades of the Second Division remained in reserve. Second Division had been commanded by Hiram G. Berry since late November. The 38-year-old Berry was a Maine native with a pedigree that included veterans of both the Revolutionary War and the War of 1812. Before the war Berry had been a bank president, politician and head of the local militia. As colonel of the Fourth Maine Volunteer Infantry, he soon came to the attention of his superiors and eventually rose to major general and divisional command.47 The three brigades that answered to Berry included the First Brigade, commanded by Brig. Gen. Joseph Carr, composed of the 1st, 11th and 16th Massachusetts, the 11th New Jersey, and the 26th Pennsylvania regiments; the Second Brigade, the Excelsiors, commanded by Revere; and the Third Brigade, or “New Jersey Blues,” commanded by Gersham Mott, composed of the 5th through 8th New Jersey, the 2nd New York, and 115th Pennsylvania.48
By 5:00 p.m. the Confederate troops, which had been moving all day, were in position. Fifteen minutes later, with only three hours of daylight remaining, Gen. Jackson gave the order. Soldiers of the Confederate II Corps poured through the rough, forested ground, driving wildlife of all kinds before them, routing the wholly unprepared Yankees of XI Corps. As the XI fell back in a panic, word reached Hooker, who called upon his closest troops to stem the flood.
Camped near Hooker’s headquarters, Berry’s Second Division was ordered to the aid of XI Corps. Hooker had commanded these boys and was confident they would not fail him. The men of the 72nd and the rest of the Excelsiors were rousted from camp and ordered to march at the double quick, leaving their backpacks behind, never to be reclaimed. “Then came the words ‘fall in’ and we were ordered to leave the knapsacks behind us, some even left their haversack behind them. We went on a double quick for about a mile up the plank road and during that time the eleventh army chore [sic], part of it was giving way,”49 remembered James Dean. Dean and the whole division were now at the double-quick going west on the Orange Plank Road, straight towards Jackson’s Rebel corps.
A short march later, Col. Stevens and his men discovered the whole of the XI Corps retiring in bad order. Jackson’s surprise attack had found them cooking supper, completely unprepared for battle, their only hint of the impending storm the bounding deer and scurrying rabbits racing through camp. “We were ordered to proceed up the Fredericksburg and Gordonsville Plank road [also known as the Orange Plank Road], to take a position in rear of the Eleventh Army Corps, which had been repulsed and broken, for the purpose of checking the enemy at that point,”50 recalled Major John Leonard.
The brigade moved a mile up the road. There, Stevens’ boys deployed to the right with 73rd New York going left, forming at right angles to the road. As other regiments arrived they were hastily “dispersed in the thick woods and undergrowth on the right of the Plank Road in a short time, no two regiments joining together,”51 reported Revere.
“We then filed into the woods and formed into line of battle,” remembered Private Dean. “We had hardly got into the woods and the line formed when we heard the rebs coming on us, we thought, but it was the eleventh army corps flying in every direction … like a lot of sheep.”52 As XI Corps men stampeded through the lines, Dean and others tried to stop them by using bayonet and saber as needed: “They thought to get through our line but we pricked them with the bayonets and then you would see them run up our lines till they got to the end of it.”53 One XI Corps man said he would stay and fight but ran at his first chance, remembered Dean. “I hollowed for him to come back and I raised my gun on him when our leutenant [sic] saw him…. He made for him and laid his head open with his sword and took his ear off with the second cut.”54 By early evening the new Federal line was taking shape, comprising the III Corps’ Second Division, a few thousand unpanicked stragglers from XI Corps and a single brigade from the II Corps that had also been in reserve. When leading Confederate elements hit the line, their advance stopped. Nightfall and Rebel ransacking of the abandoned XI Corps’ camps combined to drain the energy from Jackson’s advance. With no immediate threat of attack, the former Chautauqua district attorney Stephens directed his boys to the business of building breastworks. As men readied for a new attack by scrapping together a line using rocks, logs, dirt, anything that would stop a bullet, officers began the business of sorting through the day’s events.
With his Excelsior regiments scattered and misaligned, Revere and his staff worked to restore order. “The whole line was moved several times, and the movement of our own regiment confused by contradictory orders…. Finally, late in the evening, the connection of lines was perfected,”55 reported Lt. Col. Cornelius Westbrook of the 120th New York. Excelsior Brigade now formed a rough semicircle. The First Massachusetts, having been detached from the First Brigade and temporarily attached to the Excelsiors, now rested on the Plank Road. Forming to the right of the First Massachusetts were in order the 74th, 120th, 71st, 70th, and 72nd New Yorks, with the 26th Pennsylvania, also detached from First Brigade, on the extreme right, and the 73rd New York in reserve.56
Later, at 2 a.m. on the morning of May 3, Mott’s Third Brigade arrived from reserve and was placed south of Plank Road. Second Division was now in place. Revere’s Second Brigade composed the front line with its left resting on the road, in contact with Third Maryland, the right end of Williams’ division of the XII Corps, which was positioned wholly south of Plank Road. Third Brigade under Mott and First Brigade under Carr formed the second line. Mott was formed on the left of the road and in the rear of the XII Corps men, while Carr was placed 150 paces to the rear of the Excelsiors. Sickles was on the scene and stated complete satisfaction with the division’s arrangement.57
Night was not easy for Stevens and his New Yorkers. Captain Caspar Abell’s Company D was deployed as skirmishers, while the rest of the regiment continued to build up their breastworks of logs, sticks and earth. Frequent alarms drove the pickets in a number of times. The capture of a Confederate captain and 20 enlisted men confirmed to General Revere that “A.P. Hill was in our front, with a large force.”58 It was a brigade of Hill’s division, William Pender’s North Carolinians, that opposed the Excelsior Brigade. To gain a better understanding of the enemy arrayed before him, Stevens sent forward pickets and a small patrol led by Lieutenant Michael Cooke of E Company.59
Confederates also probed the darkness for signs of the enemy. General Jackson himself, while scouting positions in woods opposite the Excelsior’s line, was mistakenly fired upon by his own troops. Severely wounded, Jackson was carried from the field, dying a few days after the fight which followed, costing General Lee the man he considered his right hand.
Sporadic fire continued throughout the night and gained strength with the coming of daylight. “We lay in line of battle all night and as the Sabbath morn came in, the pickets in front of our line commenced firing,”60 described Pvt. Stoddard. By 6 a.m. the expected Confederate attack was underway. James Dean wrote:
As the last stick was laid on the works, the pickets began firing and I was out cutting down brush when they came, when the bullets came too thick. For when I got over the works the fighting and the musketry was terrific and the cannon, the sound of shell schreching [sic] and bursting was truly magnificent and sublime although some poor fellows was sent to his long home by every shell.61
With their pickets driven in and collected behind the line, the battle-hardened veterans of the Excelsior Brigade anticipated the enemy’s advance on their prepared positions. With low breastworks and dense forest serving as concealment, the Excelsiors allowed the enemy to move to within 80 paces of their hidden positions. When the order to fire was finally given, Northern bullets ripped into Rebel’s troops, first staggering then stopping the enemy advance.62
Berry’s line was holding well as the fight eventually developed along the whole of the Federal front. Earthworks built by Stoddard, Merrell and others served their purpose well. Excelsior men reloaded under cover, exposing themselves only to shoot on one side while the other absorbed deadly Southern lead. Stevens’ men kept up a heavy fire on the Rebels, but for some in or around Company C, the fight was too much and they broke for the rear. Intent on maintaining order, Lt. Charles Hydorn, a Pennsylvanian who’d joined C in the early days as a sergeant and since had worked his way through the ranks, moved after the cowards. Catching the men, he employed his sword. Cutting at least one shirker, he persuaded the others to return to the line. Back on the line a Rebel ball found the lieutenant. Reeling onto his back, Hydorn threw away his pistol and frantically unbuttoned his coat and pants searching for the wound’s location, knowing gut wounds were usually fatal. Finding the mortal gash, Hydorn pressed his hands upon his stomach and died, “as brave an officer as was in the service,”63 remembered Pvt. Dean.
Revere’s brigade held the line for better than 45 minutes. As Union men used the shelter of the breastworks to advantage, Rebel troops sought protection among the battlefield’s scattered trees and broken ground. Eventually Pender’s Carolinians mustered a push that came straight into the face of Third Maryland, XII Corps’ right-most regiment. Third Maryland was a veteran outfit, but a number of raw and innocent recruits were fully unprepared for the rush of screaming Rebels. The unnerved journeymen broke first, leaving holes in their company’s firing lines.64 With their line thinned, disgusted Maryland veterans motivated by self-preservation abandoned their posts, setting off a “premature and precipitate withdrawal.”65 Through the resulting gap Pender’s men poured. The 115th Pennsylvania was hurried forward from Third Brigade to plug the line, but it was in vain. All the while, General Berry directed the fight from the road. But in the chaos of Pender’s attack, an enemy bullet found the division’s chief and he fell mortally wounded. As aides rushed to Berry, chief of staff Captain John Poland dispatched a messenger to General Carr “with notice that the command devolved upon him.”66
Rout of the Marylanders now threatened Revere’s left. Sickles’ report reflected the desperate situation: “The vigor and tenacity of the enemy’s attack seemed to concentrate more and more upon my lines near the Plank road and on my left flank. As fast as their lines were broken by the terrible fire of artillery and musketry, fresh columns were deployed.”67 Enemy troops gushed through the breach, as Excelsiors found increasing numbers of Rebels both on their flank and rear. One by one the regiments began to give way as the brigade’s battle line lost integrity. His colonel and major both wounded, Captain Francis E. Tyler now was senior captain and in command of the 74th New York, left-most of the New York regiments. Tyler recalled the critical moment when “the left of the line gave way, entirely exposing our left flank, which rested near the road, and rendering the position we held untenable. It was with great reluctance that I then gave the order to fall back.”68 For many of Tyler’s men the fight had been going well, with the enemy kept at bay in their front. They were unaware of the breach on the left, so only reluctantly did they withdraw from their protected positions. Now that the Yankees were in the open, Confederate bullets that before had struck only intervening breastworks hit flesh and bone. General Revere wrote:
Our gallant soldiers, however, undauntedly returned their fire from behind their low defenses, and defiantly answered their savage yells by hearty cheering, and for several hours maintained their position, when, the enemy having turned our left flank and enfiladed the breastworks, the brigade broke off gradually, regiment after regiment, from the left, and reluctantly yielded their ground to a vastly superior force, which was, however, well punished by our men.69
Near the far end of the line, the 72nd continued their desperate fight, somewhat romantically described in the Jamestown Journal:
Early in the morning the enemy attacked a slight breastwork of logs that our boys had erected during the night, had driven back part of the brigade and were rushing over the works and pouring a raking storm of death on the brave 72d. They were also gaining their rear. Col. Stevens, cool, unappalled, fearless, was arranging his men to meet the new exigencies of this enfilading fire along the whole of his regiment in the midst of a perfect hell of fire and death, waving his sword and cheering his men to face the tempest of bullets.70
To meet the increasingly dangerous threat on his left, Stevens began to change the facing of the regiment. He ordered, “Change front to the rear on the first company! Boys follow me!”71 Stevens then turned partially around to lead his men and was struck through the chest by an enemy ball. Pressing his hand to his breast, Stevens exclaimed, “O, God!” and fell. Lieutenant Henry Yates of Co. D immediately attended to Stevens, who lay unconscious under the lethal Confederate cross fire. Captain Samuel Bailey of Co. I and Captain Harmon Bliss of Co. G struggled to bear their beloved colonel to safety, but the situation was too far gone. With the enemy swarming over their position, Bliss, who had led the regiment at Kettle Run, was struck and severely wounded as he attended his colonel. As Stevens lay wounded with the other officers, command devolved to Major John Leonard, who struggled to keep the regiment together. As the 72nd line continued to recede before the Rebel tide, Stevens, Bliss and the other wounded or disabled men were reluctantly left to the enemy. Becoming prisoners, they were at once removed to the Confederate rear.72
With enemy troops swarming over the regiment’s position and the fighting now hand to hand, Confederate trophy-hunters became intent on seizing the regimental colors. Thomas Auldridge was the color sergeant this day. Auldridge had started the war with the 73rd New York, comprising mainly New York City firemen, but had transferred to the 72nd’s Company K.73 In the swirling fight, four Rebs in succession made grabs for the flags and each was cut down in the process. The situation was too hot and Auldridge knew it. Tearing the colors from their staff, he stuffed them inside his coat and made his way to the rear. Sgt. James Anderson of Co. F, posted behind the colors, recognized the situation, gathered up the staff and followed the colors out. Beyond the reach of the enemy, staff and colors were reunited and Third Excelsior’s flag flew again.74
“They threw a very heavy force on the left of our Brigade and broke through the line and got on our flank and in that way our Regt. suffered a cross fire. But we hung on to them till our little Col. Stevens was killed and the orders came for us to fall back out of the woods,”75 remembered Pvt. Stoddard.
Over in Company H the situation for Lucius Jones and his mates was no less desperate. “It seemed all over with us, and our prospects for Rebel prison was very flattering,”76 remember Lucius. With New Yorkers and Carolinians completely mixed, Rebels demanded Yankee surrender. In a desperate moment of democracy, the choice being surrender or potential death, H’s Captain John W. Holmes asked his men what they intended to do. When word came back that all would stick with their captain and make a run for it, “we took leg bail and started—the Rebels after us.”77 Running pell-mell through the woods, two of Jones’ Company were overtaken and made prisoner, but speed and Yankee cannon worked to save the rest. “As we came to the open field we could see our artillery on the other side. When we got almost across we were signaled to lie down,”78 recalled Jones. “In a moment we were flat on our faces. Hell seemed to let loose over our heads, and the ranks of the pursuers seemed fairly to vanish. We were saved, but not the battle.”79
Retreating, the men supported a battery of Federal cannon that fired upon the advancing Confederate ranks. As the enemy continued to follow, the artillery played upon their ranks, halting their advance. The fighting was among dried leaves and brush, and embers from the exploding shot and shell soon set the woods on fire, burning both corpses and the immobile wounded alike. James Dean described what he saw:
The troops on our left then gave way when we cheered them to their works and they fired a few more volleys but the rebels marched up in coloms [sic] 4 or 5 deep and got over the works on our left and the first thing we knew was we were receiving a fire on our flank. We then had to run and it was then we lost a good many men. We fell back to our old breast works and as soon as they drove out of site [sic], our artillery open on them and must have mowed them down by the hundreds. The woods was set on fire by the artillery and all the wounded must have been burnt to ashes that could not get out.80
With Berry dead, Carr continued to fight the Rebel advance, though both ammunition and his men’s nerves were giving out. Seventh New Jersey, part of Mott’s Brigade, took itself out of the line, marching their 400 men far to the rear. To Carr, the timing could not have been worse; he wrote, “At this critical period of the engagement, he [commander Col. Louis Francine] could illy be spared, and the loss of his men was severely felt.”81
Severely outnumbered, the various brigades began falling back. Revere, thinking he was now the division’s senior officer, took matters into his own hands. The brigade was becoming more disorganized, so around 8 a.m. Revere took the 73rd New York and nearly 600 stragglers from “almost every regiment in the division”82 under tow. He then sought instruction from General William French, commanding a division of II Corps, as to the best place to employ his small force. Directed to a line of abatis and breastworks, Revere found the position full of troops and reasoned any additional would be “superfluous.” The area was covered with troops, and Revere noticed a constant stream of men heading to the rear. He “decided to intercept them by striking a straight course by compass through the woods from that point toward the ford.”83
Men couldn’t understand why they were being pulled out and moved to the rear while the fight was here, the popular view holding that the Excelsiors had never run from a fight. Subordinate officers quietly questioned the wisdom of marching to the rear,84 while others recognized they could better intercept the fleeing men from a position further in the rear and that they “had an opportunity for rest and a meal.”85
When in position nearly three miles in the rear, Revere sent out officers from all the regiments present to collect up stragglers. By noon his command numbered barely 1,700 men, representing nine separate regiments. With Lt. Col. Austin still absent, Major Leonard was in charge and could account for only 204 of the more than four hundred 72nd men who had taken the field. This number slowly increased as they were resupplied with ammunition, rested and refreshed, getting them ready to again “take the field,” though only about half the brigade was present.86
With Revere’s pull-out, the entire division began to crumble. Facing “galling fire from the enemy’s artillery,”87 Carr moved his division back. Locating Sickles, Carr was directed to position his men in support of Whipple’s Third Division.
Overall the battle was going poorly for the Army of the Potomac. Enemy attacks and the collapse of the XI Corps had shaken Hooker’s offensive spirit, and he now saw the battle strictly in defensive terms. Early in the day’s battle, Sickles’ First and Third divisions found themselves defending the only real piece of high ground on the battlefield, a place called Hazel Grove, south of Plank Road. The Hazel Grove position was effectively dividing the Rebel assault, preventing the enemy from presenting a unified front against Hooker’s right flank. Sickles argued in favor of holding this ground, but Hooker ordered him to withdraw, worried the position would become isolated and cut off from the rest of the army. As Sickles reluctantly removed his two divisions, Confederates scrambled to occupy the newly vacated high ground. Soon several batteries of Southern cannon were firing down on surrounding Union positions, positions occupied primarily by Sickles’ men, who only minutes before had held the grove. Not long after the order came to vacate Hazel Grove, Union efforts were dealt another heavy blow. A well-placed Rebel cannon ball shattered a porch column of the house used by Hooker as headquarters. The ball struck near where Hooker was standing, having just receiving a message from an aide. Flying timber struck the commanding general, dazing him severely. Essentially incapacitated and unable to command effectively, he nonetheless refused to transfer command to subordinates. While some of his corps commanders urged him to counterattack with the several unengaged divisions at his disposal, Hooker instead ordered withdrawal.88
Both the right flank and center of the Union lines fell back under strong pressure from the Confederates. But despite the lack of decisive leadership from Hooker, Union defensive positions gradually improved. Good defensive ground combined with a consolidation of men and artillery to help stall the Rebel advance. By mid-afternoon Federal lines were holding. At 2:30, with the heaviest of the fighting over, Revere brought his brigade, now 2,000 men strong, back to the front. Upon reporting to his corps commander, the wayward brigadier was promptly relieved of duty by the livid Sickles. Colonel J. Egbert Farnum of the 70th New York then took command of Second Brigade.89 Revere felt justified in his action and claimed the support of at least a few of his officers. Yet Sickles would still conclude, “Brigadier-General Revere, … heedless of their murmurs, shamefully led to the rear the whole of the Second Brigade and portions of two others, … thus subjecting these proud soldiers for the first time to the humiliation of being marched to the rear while their comrades were under fire.”90 Colonel Farnum recalled, “At about 3 p.m. the same day, I was officially informed that General Revere was relieved from duty, and then the command of the brigade devolved upon me, whereupon I assumed command, and Lieutenant-Colonel Holt took command of the regiment.”91
Sometime that afternoon, Corporal George Tate of Company D woke up to find himself a prisoner. Wounded and rendered unconscious during the heaviest of the morning’s fight, Tate and others were at Dowdall’s Tavern, now about one mile in the Confederate rear. Among the Union wounded and captured was Colonel Stevens. Recognizing the colonel’s condition as mortal, Tate, and the others who could, worked to comfort their chief. Throughout the remainder of Sunday and into the next day the men did what they could for Stevens. Finally, around 8 p.m. on Monday the 4th, Stevens slipped away. Grief stricken, Tate and others from the regiment dutifully buried their beloved colonel near Old Wilderness Church, taking special care to mark the grave for future identification should a later opportunity come to move him.92
By the end of the 4th, fighting around Chancellorsville was mostly over. “We laid the next day at the breast works and were not disturbed only by an occasional shell,”93 recalled James Dean. By 3 a.m. on the morning of the 5th, the remaining men of the regiment began marching north. Heavy rains turned the roads into an “awful condition,”94 but by five o’clock that afternoon they reached the camp they had left only a week earlier.95
Major John Leonard later reported that of the 29 officers and 411 enlisted men of the 72nd New York who had gone into action at Chancellorsville, 104 were either, killed, wounded or listed as missing, one-fourth of the entire command. Among them were their commander, Colonel Stevens, and the highly respected Captain Bliss. Bliss, an integral fixture within the regiment, was held by the enemy until the 13th, when he was released and placed in the III Corps hospital.96 The fight cost three lieutenants including Hydorn, William Brooks of Co. F, and Harrison Ellis of Co. K. Of the three winners of the March shooting contest, only John Bourne survived unscathed. Horace Wilcox was captured in the battle. Once paroled, Wilcox deserted six weeks later. Emerson Merrell, the oldest of ten children from upstate New York, was among the dead. His body was never identified, and Emerson was eventually interred in one of the mass graves used to bury the large number of unidentified dead.97
The Army of the Potomac was once again repulsed. The various regiments began to look toward their own well-being. A detachment from the 72nd New York was formed on May 13 to search for the missing and wounded under agreement with the Confederates. It was headed by surgeon Charles Irwin and regimental chaplain William Eastman. While searching the battlefield they learned the details of the death of their beloved Col. Stevens and his burial place. Men throughout the regiment wept at the news. Stevens’ body was removed from its Wilderness Church grave and brought across the United States Ford by ambulance. There, the Colonel’s father, Judge William Stevens met it. On May 14, Stevens’ body was taken under regimental escort to Stoneman’s Switch, where it then proceeded home to Dunkirk and final burial a few days later at nearby Fredonia.98
Hooker’s army eventually retreated back to the north side of the United States Ford. Their offensive, intended to end the war, had lasted less than two weeks. The Excelsior Brigade suffered over 300 killed, wounded, and missing during the Chancellorsville campaign. This number was far less, however, than either of the other two brigades within III Corps’ Second Division, whose losses exceeded 500 each. Of the six regiments under Revere, 72nd New York’s losses were heaviest.99
With his corps safely back north, Dan Sickles turned his attention to Gen. Joseph W. Revere. Not satisfied to relieve Revere of his command, Sickles leveled charges and instituted court-martial proceedings. The charges centered on Revere’s acting without orders and subjecting Sickles’ former brigade, the Excelsiors, to the “humiliation” of being marched to the rear. Revere argued that his command had become scattered and disorganized. He said he intended to withdraw the command, rebuild its numbers, feed, rest, and rearm them, and then return to the field as a potent fighting force. Because he had done this without orders, the court-martial board found him guilty, sentencing him to a disgraceful dismissal from the service. Hooker was quick to endorse the dismissal order, lest there be too few scapegoats.100 But soon after the court-martial, Revere campaigned to regain some shred of his reputation. Eventually none other than President Abraham Lincoln interceded on the defrocked general’s behalf. Though it is unclear what motivated the decision—perhaps interest in minimizing the political damage from the Chancellorsville debacle—Lincoln revoked the dismissal in exchange for the general’s resignation, which was accepted on August 10, 1863. So sure was Revere of the rightness of his action that before the year was out he published a 50-page pamphlet complete with maps and transcripts from the court-martial in a further attempt at self-exoneration.101
With Revere out and his reputation in tatters, command of Excelsior Brigade devolved to Colonel William Brewster of the 73rd New York. Brewster had been with the brigade since the beginning and would be there during some of its most desperate hours.
Back in camp a meeting of the regiment was held on May 18. Chaired by Col. Brewster, a letter of praise for Col. Stevens and condolence to his family was drafted. Expressing their grief over his loss and the heroic nature of his leadership, the letter was submitted to various newspapers throughout New York state and elsewhere, a symbol of the regiment’s sense of loss and devotion to their fallen comrade:
In the loss of Colonel William O. Stevens, the regiment and the army has been deprived of the services of a most gallant and efficient officer, an accomplished gentleman and true patriot, who has sealed with his life his devotion to his country, and our highest aspirations for the future shall be to emulate the noble example of fidelity to trust that he has bequeathed to us…. To the afflicted family, in their bereavement, words of condolence and sympathy are all we can bestow; our loss has been great, theirs has been greater … realizing that though he sleeps, his memory will not be forgotten, but will descend to posterity with names of the illustrious dead, which a grateful country will render immortal.102
Newspapers throughout New York reported the death of Stevens, but the loss was especially deep-felt in Dunkirk and Jamestown, where he and Captain Bliss were looked upon as a home-town heroes. The Jamestown Journal invoked the words of Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar in reporting on the life of Stevens and of his funeral attended by 5,000 mourners:
Brave soldier! Noble man! Glorious martyr! Pride of thy country! We will weep over his grave and cherish his memory when stone and “enduring brass” moulder…. His character, combining all the nobility of nature with the accomplishments of culture … so mixed in him, that Nature might stand up and say to all the world—THIS WAS A MAN!103
With their colonel now dead, the officers of the 72nd looked to the regiment’s founder as its next commander. At a regimental meeting, it was decided Nelson Taylor, the now retired, original commander of the 72nd, should be asked to come back and assume the role of colonel. In a letter dated May 26, the men of the Third Regiment and the Excelsior Brigade did “earnestly request,” that Taylor “assume the duties and become our commander.” The letter was signed by Lt. Col. John Austin, Major Leonard, and captains Caspar Abell and John Sandford.104
Taylor wrote on May 29 that while he was flattered by the offer and gratified to be so favorably remembered, circumstances were such that he must “forego the acceptance of your generous offices.”105 He thus declined to again command the 72nd, trusting the position would be more ably filled by an officer still with the regiment. That officer was Lt. Col. John Austin, who was promoted to full colonel and to command of the 72nd, backdated to May 4, the day of Stevens’ death. As for Captain Harmon Bliss, he would linger for a month, finally succumbing to his wounds on June 6.106
Within days of the first shots at Chancellorsville, Hooker’s defeated army was back in camp at Falmouth. The campaign to end the war that had looked so good on paper and had prompted the over-confident Hooker to crow that the Confederate Army was now his “legitimate property”107 was over. Hooker was shaken and unsure, uncertain of the army’s next move. But despite his army’s losses, Robert E. Lee was sure and confident and now cast a covetous eye north, away from war-ravaged Virginia and to the rich, unspoiled farmlands of Pennsylvania.