CHAPTER FIVE
SEPTEMBER 19, 1864
With the VI and XIX corps fought to a standstill, Sheridan called upon the Army of West Virginia. While many of the regiments were from West Virginia, some of the men hailed from Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Massachusetts. Counted among these troops were veterans of the battle of New Market. Others had seen hard service in the mountains of western Virginia and east Tennessee, thus gaining the moniker the “Mountain Creepers.” They called themselves “Crook’s Buzzards” after their commander, Maj. Gen. George Crook.
The Buzzards had spent the day back in the Berryville Canyon. In answer to Sheridan’s summons, Crook led his men forward through the gorge and directed them into line. First, he sent Col. Joseph Thoburn’s division into the First Woods to backstop their comrades. Colonel Isaac Duval’s division followed, extending the Union line past a stream called Red Bud Run to the high ground beyond. Crook’s deployment of Duval’s division was astride the Confederate left flank, with a prime position to turn the enemy line. Crook then dispatched a staff officer, Capt. William McKinley, to instruct Thoburn to advance after Duval’s men initiated the assault.
Jubal Early could be proud of the way his Southerners had fought. Greatly outnumbered, the infantry divisions of Stephen Ramseur, John Gordon, and the deceased Robert Rodes had held their own. When the opportunity arose, they had launched devastating counterattacks. Now, across the fields to the west, another Union assault was organizing against them, and Old Jube had to gamble. He called from the left flank John Breckenridge’s division, under the direct control of Brig. Gen. Gabriel Wharton, to bolster his line. Wharton would leave behind the brigade of Col. George Patton to support the cavalry.
The gamble would not pay off.
Instead, according to Capt. James Garnett of Rodes’ staff, “the withdrawal of this division … may be attributed the loss of the day, for now our disasters commenced.”
Around 3 p.m., Crook gave the order to attack. The Buzzards went forward with a cheer, down the slope toward Red Bud Run. In some places, the stream had running water but in others the autumn weather had dried it out. “A very destructive fire was opened upon us, in the midst of which our men rushed into and over the creek …” cringed Col. Rutherford B. Hayes, leading a brigade in Duval’s division. “[A]ll seemed inspired by the right spirit and charged the rebel works pell-mell in the most determined manner.”
The Union lines pushed forward, pressing their foe out of the Second Woods. It was here that Crook’s divisions joined in; however, the Federals were unable to go on. Despite having abandoned their position, Rodes’ and Gordon’s Confederates maintained a murderous fire on the Buzzards. The Confederate line was bent, but not broken.
“AN ORDER FOR A GENERAL FORWARD MOVEMENT WAS GIVEN AND AWAY WE WENT.”
—FEDERAL OFFICER
The assault had its desired effect, though, and allowed the Army of the Shenandoah to regain the initiative.
It was now reaching 4 p.m., and the fighting was at a crescendo. Because the XIX Corps was wrecked from the morning’s fighting, it would be up to Crook and Wright to win the day. “General Sheridan rode down the line hat in hand, and the whole army cheered and shouted itself hoarse,” a Rhode Islander recounted. “An order for a general forward movement was given and away we went.” To follow up the Buzzards’ success, Sheridan issued orders for a general advance all along his line. Sheridan was putting all his chips on the table.
For the last time that day, the Federals moved forward. All across the fields east of Winchester, the blue infantry pressed the gray—and this time, Little Phil brought to bear a force that would tip the scales in his favor: his mounted divisions.
Earlier that morning, Sheridan ordered the cavalry divisions of Brig. Gens. Wesley Merritt and William Averell to move well beyond the Union right. Their assignment was to either keep the enemy forces north of Winchester occupied while the infantry moved on Ramseur or attack the enemy rear as the situation warranted. Under the overall direction of Maj. Gen. Alfred Torbert, Merritt’s division forced a crossing of the Opequon. The brigades of Col. Charles Lowell and Brig. Gen. George A. Custer forded the stream with only token resistance. They were followed by the brigade of Thomas Devin. Several hours after Merritt crossed, Averell’s division rode through the tributary to the Valley Pike and headed south.
As Sheridan’s infantry engaged their counterparts in the fields around the Berryville Turnpike, the Yankee troopers engaged the Southern cavalrymen holding the Confederate left flank. The Southerners got the best of the better armed and better equipped Yankees. Through dogged skirmishing, they slowed the Federal advance to a crawl. Faced with overwhelming numbers, though, the Confederates had to retreat from Bunker Hill to Stephenson’s Depot, but they did so slowly to try and delay the Union cavalry for as long as possible.
Just as Ramseur’s division slowed the Yankee advance that morning, so too, did Breckinridge. It would take most of the morning and part of the afternoon before the divisions of Averell and Merritt could join together. When they finally did unite around Stephenson’s Depot, though, the Union horsemen presented an intimidating sight. Torbert directed the combined divisions to ride south along the Valley Pike, toward the sound of the guns east of Winchester.
The ground north of Winchester over which the Union cavalry advanced was clear and ideally suited to the maneuvers of mounted soldiers. “The field was open for cavalry operations as the war has not seen,” attested Merritt.
Nearing the city, the divisions reached a point just opposite the Rebel fortification known as Fort Collier. The fortification was constructed during the early euphoria of the war in 1861. With bugles blaring, Custer’s Michigan brigade led the way. The Union horsemen thundered forward. As the assault struck home, the Confederate line around the fort collapsed under the weight of the mounted charge.
With the lines breaking around Fort Collier and the infantry pressing the Confederates, the weakened Army of the Valley broke under the pressure. Union cavalry thundered forward. Henry Kyd Douglas, who had served with Stonewall Jackson during the 1862 Valley campaign, remembered the Confederates responding with something reminiscent of the Napoleonic age. “For the first time I saw a division of infantry … form a hollow square to resist cavalry,” he wrote.
During the savage fighting north of Winchester, the great-grandfather of the legendary World War II general, George Patton, was mortally wounded.
Thousands of Confederates streamed through the city in retreat.
* * *
The Union cavalry had collapsed the left flank of the Confederate army. Early rushed to Brig. Gen. Bryan Grimes, who had taken over for Rodes, and ordered him to refuse the flank of his division to stave off the assault. With Grimes threatening to “blow the brains out” of any who broke for the rear, the Confederates tried to fashion “. dc. oi.s m.a nmsotewenr coseu dr.” — Confederate Officer a resistance. Grimes admitted in a letter home that the “troops did not behave with their usual valor.” A foot soldier was in agreement when he wrote, “We had one of the worst stampedes from Winchester you ever heard of.”
Confederates retreated pell-mell through Winchester. (WRHS)
The confused retreat mixed commands, yet luckily for the Confederates, Ramseur’s division kept its composure. The North Carolinian, who had opened the battle that morning, conducted a measured withdrawal and covered the retreat of the army as they fled from the field. This rearguard saved the majority of the wagons and artillery.
As the artillery was coming off the field, a comical occurrence happened between an artillerist and the Confederate army commander. As Pvt. Milton Humphrey’s crew withdrew their artillery piece, Old Jube came upon them. Seeing they were trying to ram free the choked barrel, he ordered them to desist and leave the gun. One of the gun crew did not recognize the Confederate leader and exclaimed “go to Hell you damned old clodhopper and tend to your own business.”
The “old clodhopper” did make one important decision that saved his army during the retreat. Colonel Thomas Munford’s cavalry brigade was ordered from the far right to the collapsed left of the line. The Virginians that comprised the brigade arrived in Star Fort in time for artillery to be dragged out, saving valuable time for the hurriedly retreating Confederates.
Darkness finally enveloped the Valley. During the night, the Confederates continued to file down the Valley Turnpike. The bleak day witnessed the first time that Jackson’s old Second Corps had ever been driven from a battlefield in the Shenandoah Valley.
The third—and what would be the final—battle of Winchester was over. For Sheridan, it had been a hardwon fight. There was little time to rest, though, for Little Phil’s blood was up. He was not going to allow Early time to recover. The hounds were after the fox. At his headquarters that night, the Federal commander issued orders for a pursuing march to begin at 5 a.m. the next morning.
Fort Collier was built in July 1861 to guard the Valley Pike as it entered Winchester from the north. During the fighting of Third Winchester, Confederate artillerymen and soldiers—including men from the brigade of Col. George Patton—unsuccessfully defended Fort Collier against Union assaults. Today, earthworks are still present, and one can walk the grounds during daylight hours. The site is preserved by the Fort Collier Civil War Center, a non-profit organization dedicated to the preservations of the earthworks at Fort Collier. (DD/PG))
In town, Winchester residents, unbeknown at the time, had seen the last of the Confederate army for the duration of the war. Winchester had changed hands for the last time.
