CHAPTER SIX
SEPTEMBER 19-22, 1864
The black night enveloped Jubal Early and his army as they marched south, away from the battlefield at Winchester. The Confederates were bound for Fisher’s Hill, a prominence south of Strasburg that rose up from the Valley floor like a beacon to the retreating Confederates. As they marched south, spirits were mixed. One soldier remarked the army “was much jaded but not at all dispirited.”
“Jaded”—and thinned in numbers. All told, Early had lost around 30 percent of his army at Third Winchester. The losses in the officer corps would have the most impact. The names of Robert Johnston, Archibald Godwin, George Patton, Fitz Lee, and Zebulon York could be found on the casualty list. Most damaging to the army was the death of Robert Rodes. In addition to these high level officers, more than 20 regimental commanders were lost.
Early wrote later that he halted at Fisher’s Hill because “this was the only position in the whole Valley where a defensive line could be taken against an enemy moving up the Valley.” Situated between Massanutten Mountain on the east and Little North Mountain on the west, this high ground was an ideal place for Early to consolidate his army. However, the position also had its weaknesses. The most glaring was that Early’s infantry could not cover the entire line. Consequently, Early was forced to place cavalry on his left flank. Although it initially fought well at Third Winchester, the cavalry had become overmatched by their Union counterparts late on the day of September 19. Outnumbered and outgunned, the cavalry had lost control of the left flank which was one of the major reasons the Confederate line collapsed. Old Jube and the infantry had justifiable concern about the ability and morale of the cavaliers following Third Winchester.
THE BATTLE OF FISHER’S HILL—Just as he had helped turn the tide at Third Winchester, George Crook played an important part in the battle of Fisher’s Hill. Late in the afternoon, Crook attacked the Confederate flank. This poorly defended section quickly gave, allowing Crook to drive down the length of the Rebel line. Pressed by Crook on his left and Wright and Emory on his front, Early was forced to abandon Fisher’s Hill.
The Union soldiers who marched south on the morning of September 20 were buoyed by the previous day’s combat. A VI Corps surgeon wrote that Third Winchester was a “signal rout of the enemy and success to our arms.”
While in pursuit of their prey, the Yankees no doubt took stock of their losses. They had lost between 4,000 and 5,000 men during the previous day’s battle. Not the least of these was David Russell. His successor, Emory Upton, fell, too—wounded during the assault that broke the Rebel line. Also wounded and out of action was one of Crook’s division commanders, Isaac Duval.
The Federal vanguard reached Strasburg in the afternoon and was greeted by an awesome sight. There before them lay the Army of the Valley, nestled in their fortifications atop Fisher’s Hill. It was readily apparent, even to an aggressive officer like Sheridan, that any frontal assault would be suicidal. To discuss his options for an offensive, Little Phil called a council of war.
Sheridan received news of the rout at Winchester and immediately began plotting his move toward the Confederate position along Fisher’s Hill. (LOC)
Attending the conference were Crook, Emory, and Wright. The possibility of storming the position head on was quickly nixed. Moving around the enemy right, meanwhile, would expose the attackers to the signal station atop Massanutten Mountain and spoil the element of surprise. Crook suggested an attack on the left flank, situated near Little North Mountain. All things considered, this proposal was the most feasible, and Little Phil agreed. The Buzzards would attack the Confederate flank, and while they did, Alfred Torbert was ordered to take his horsemen and proceed through the adjoining Luray Valley to New Market Gap. It was Sheridan’s hope that if the assault on Fisher’s Hill was successful, then his horsemen would be able to cut off and trap the Army of the Valley as they retreated southward.
A postwar view of Fisher’s Hill (LOC)
Along Fisher’s Hill, Early positioned his men from right to left in the following order. Gabriel Wharton’s division held the extreme right near Massanutten Mountain. With a bend of the North Fork of the Shenandoah River, this position was almost unassailable. Lining up to the left of Wharton’s division was John Gordon’s veterans followed by Stephen Ramseur’s division, now under the command of Brig. Gen. John Pegram. Ramseur slid over to take command of Rodes’ division. He was a familiar face to the men in the ranks and had been personally requested to take command by a member of Rodes’ staff.
On the left of Ramseur’s division and holding the army’s flank was the cavalry division of Maj. Gen. Lunsford L. Lomax. Compared to their Union counterparts, these horsemen were poorly armed and vastly undermanned. Veterans of the Army of the Valley questioned why these troopers were placed in this key defensive position. “All our misfortunes were caused by depending on the cavalry, a soldier in the 4th Georgia later wrote. “Neither fights [Third Winchester and Fisher’s Hill] was our infantry whipped but forced to fall back because the cavalry let the Yankees flank our position.”
Early never gave a reason why he overlooked his suspect alignment, writing only that “the enemy’s immense superiority in cavalry and the inefficiency of the greater part of mine has been the cause of all my defeats.” Historians have been left to marvel, without any definitive evidence because of the scarcity of Confederate primary accounts, why the cavalry were put in this vulnerable position.
Throughout September 21, the Federals shuffled their lines. In an effort to mask his movements, Sheridan extended the VI and XIX Corps beyond Strasburg. Meanwhile, the Army of West Virginia rested in the woods north of Cedar Creek. Another storm was approaching and the men knew it. On the morrow, it would start in earnest.
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On September 22, Crook’s Buzzards lived up to their other nickname, the “Mountain Creepers.” That morning, the West Virginians marched around the rear of the army and, by noon, were poised to begin their final creep along the mountain. Around 2 p.m., their actual flanking maneuver commenced. “I formed my command in two columns,” Crook wrote, “and marched them by the right flank along the side of the mountain.”
Atop Fisher’s Hill, Early had begun preparations to abandon the line. He ordered up the artillery caissons and chests to carry the ammunition so the withdrawal from the position at Fisher’s Hill further up the Valley could begin quickly once darkness fell. Early knew an attack was imminent. Even holding such a strong position, Old Jube’s thinned ranks could not withstand a wholesale onslaught.
About a half mile from the enemy left, Crook deployed his men from column into line of battle. Around 4 p.m. with a shout, the Buzzards advanced down the mountain slope. The ground was so broken with rocks, thickets, and underbrush that all semblance of a formation was lost by the time the Federals struck the Confederate cavalry.
The assault did not come as a complete surprise. One Confederate artillerist spotted the Mountain Creepers “plainly climbing up the side of North Mountain.” He added, “Gen. Early knows this and has troops there to meet them, and unless he has, we will have to get from this position, and very quickly.”
The Union infantry slammed into the Confederate cavalry, and the left flank crumbled—overwhelmed by the ferocity of the Union attack, whose infantry were “yelling like madmen.” Union Gen. Rutherford Hayes, in charge of a division, wrote afterwards that Confederate captives complained of being “thunderstruck” and “swore we had crossed the mountains.” A Confederate infantryman wrote later that “our cavalry rushed down like the swine with an overdose of devils.”
The 1st Maryland Cavalry (Confederate) attempted a counterattack to stem Crook’s advance but was easily repulsed.
After brushing aside the cavalry, the divisions of Hays and Thoburn continued on toward the main Rebel battle line. Thoburn wrote afterwards that his men were “one large body of advancing soldiers, the bolder and stouter men being nearer the front, and the rear pushing eagerly forward and shouting and hurrahing and firing after the fast receding foe.” Crook, meanwhile, remained behind the lines, a bundle of rocks under one arm, which he hurled at any of his men who tried to leave the ranks.
Witnessing the collapse of the cavalry, Stephen Ramseur repositioned Cullen Battle’s Alabama brigade and some artillery to meet the tidal wave of blue coming from the left flank. Ramseur also sent the brigade of William Cox to Battle’s assistance. With all the confusion and scrambling, Cox got lost and did not participate in the fight. Battle’s men, along with units from Bryan Grimes’ brigade, did all they could to hold on. It would be for naught. As Crook’s assault hit home, Horatio Wright ordered his VI Corps divisions forward. Struck in the front and flank, the Confederate line began to give way.
Brig. Gen. George Crook had already come to grief in the Valley earlier in the year—in July at the second battle of Kernstown. By autumn, he was ready for payback. His men played critical roles in the battles of Third Winchester and Fisher’s Hill. (LOC)
Crook’s “Mountain Creepers” formed up for their attack in these woods. (DD/PG)
The VI Corps advanced from the heights opposite the Confederate position, crossed a stream known as Tumbling Run, and began their ascent of Fisher’s Hill. James Ricketts’ division overwhelmed the rest of Ramseur’s division still posted in the main line. Early, arriving on the scene, ordered Gabriel Wharton to pull his division from the right of the line to reinforce the left.
This effort would be too little too late. As Hayes and Thoburn continued the attack, George Getty’s division struck John Pegram, and Pegram’s line also gave way. Pegram’s retreat left only John Gordon’s division in the main line. Gordon’s ranks had been seriously thinned fighting for the Second Woods at Winchester, so it was not long before his ranks gave way before the pressure of Frank Wheaton’s advance. Over on the right, soldiers from the XIX Corps occupied the enemy works that had been vacated by Gabriel Wharton.
Fisher’s Hill now belonged to Sheridan’s victorious legions.
The retreating Rebels streamed up the Valley Pike. Similar to Winchester, a few units maintained their integrity. A few officers were able to rally some soldiers near Mount Pleasant to further strengthen the Confederate rearguard.
Brig. Gen. Bryan Grimes, in charge of a brigade of North Carolinians, tried to maintain their defensive position even as the Confederate left flank collapsed. However, when the VI Corps launched a frontal assault against their position, the Confederates, faced with overwhelming numbers on two sides, began to give way. (LOC)
As darkness blanketed the Valley, a firefight broke out with some pursuing Yankees. One of the casualties of the skirmish was Alexander “Sandie” Pendleton. Now a lieutenant colonel, Pendleton had served faithfully on “Stonewall” Jackson’s staff in the early stages of the war. After Jackson’s death the previous spring, Pendleton remained with the Second Corps and was serving as Early’s chief of staff. Shot in the abdomen, Pendleton died the next day in Woodstock. Early, in his memoirs of the last year of the war, said Pendleton “was acting with his accustomed gallantry” when he fell, “and his loss was deeply felt and regretted.” From an irascible man like Early, this was high praise.
The Federals attacked uphill toward Confederates positioned along the crest. (DD/PG)
Although Early would write later that “our loss in killed and wounded in this affair was slight,” he did admit that “some prisoners were taken.” However, these simple statements do not attest to the damage to morale the army had suffered. For the second time in three days, Early’s army had been put to flight. Coupled with the numbers lost in battle, morale plummeted.
During the retreat from Fisher’s Hill, a Confederate infantryman remembered passing by a comrade who was casually cooking his supper near the road. The man could be heard singing an impromptu song. One of the lines: “Old Jube Early’s about played out.”
