4 0 The American Civil Warthe Warrenton Turnpike for a final push
against Henry Hill, Confederates sought to
knit together a stable defensive line. Among
the southern troops going into position was
a brigade of five Virginia regiments led by
Brigadier-General Thomas Jonathan Jackson.
This dour Virginian, a graduate of West Point
in 1846, had fought with distinction in
Mexico and later taught at the Virginia
Military Institute. As Jackson's soldiers
went into position on Henry Hill,
Brigadier-General Barnard Bee of South
Carolina, whose brigade had fought on
Matthew's Hill, remarked that the enemy
'are beating us back.' 'Sir,' replied Jackson,
'we will give them the bayonet.'
Fighting swayed back and forth across the
crest and along the slopes of Henry Hill
between about 1.30 and 3.30 pm. Near the
eye of the storm stood the home of Judith
Carter Henry, an 85-year-old bedridden
widow who became the only civilian killed
during the battle (various accounts place the
number of wounds she suffered as high as
13). Jackson's brigade played a major part in
the action. At one point, General Bee
approached a group of soldiers standing
some distance behind Jackson's position and
asked, 'What regiment is this?' 'Why
General, don't you know your own men?'
replied an officer. 'This is what is left of the
4th Alabama.' The men said they would
follow Bee back into the fight, whereupon he
pointed towards his left and shouted:
'Yonder stands Jackson like a stone wall; let's
go to his assistance.' Thus was born the most
famous soubriquet of the Civil War.
The climax on Henry Hill came at about
4 pm. Confederate brigades under Colonels
Jubal A. Early, Arnold Elzey and Joseph
B. Kershaw had hurried forward from
Manassas Junction. The weight of their
bayonets turned the tide, propelling
exhausted Federals away from the high
ground. 'We scared the enemy worse than
we hurt him,' remarked Early later. 'He had
been repulsed, not routed. When, however,
the retreat began, it soon degenerated into a
rout from the panic-stricken fears of the
enemy's troops.' Beauregard next ordered a
general advance. Hungry, thirsty, hot and
without experience in such situations,
thousands of Union troops decided they had
seen enough. 'The men seemed to be seized
simultaneously by the conviction that it was
no use to do anything more,' observed a
northern officer, 'and they might as well
start home.'
The tide of humanity sweeping away from
the battlefield included a number of people
who had ridden out from Washington to
watch the action. Soldiers discarded their
weapons and pressed eastwards in the midst
of cannons, caissons and wagons, jostling for
position among civilians in fine carriages.
Congressman Alfred Ely of New York was
taken prisoner, barely escaping death at the
hands of an infuriated South Carolina colonel
who tried to shoot him. 'He's a member of
Congress, God damn him,' raged the colonel.
'Came out here to see the fun! Came to see us
whipped and killed! God damn him! If it was
not for such as he there would be no war.
They've made it and then come to gloat over
it! God damn him. I'll show him.'
The Confederates made only a feeble
effort to harry the retreating Federals.
Although this failure would prompt a great
deal of criticism, the southern army almost
certainly lacked the discipline to mount an
effective pursuit. Victory had left Johnston's
and Beauregard's soldiers nearly as
disorganized as their foe. By the end of the
following day, McDowell's army had
gathered itself near Washington. Any chance
for a Confederate counterstroke had passed.
The Battle of First Manassas or Bull Run
(Confederates called it the former, Federals
the latter) set a new standard for bloodletting
in American history. Union casualties totalled
2,896, and the Confederates lost 1,982 men.
Carnage at later battles would dwarf these
figures, but in July 1861 the respective
nations viewed the battle as a ghastly affair. It
foreshadowed later engagements in a number
of respects. Both commanding generals
sought to avoid frontal assaults by launching
flank movements. The side with interior lines
held an advantage, as the Confederates used
the Manassas Gap Railroad to effect a