Corps, formerly Maj. Gen. Nathaniel
Bank’s II Corps in the Army of Virginia, in
the aftermath of Maj. Gen. John Pope’s
defeat at Second Bull Run. Mansfield was
seized with a premonition of impending
disaster. At the close of a visit with Navy
Secretary Gideon Welles, an old friend
from Connecticut, he took his leave, declar-
ing, “We shall probably never meet again.”
Just hours before departing Washington on
September 13, 1862, Mansfield penned a
brief note to his old West Point teacher Syl-
vanus Thayer “to say that if I never see you
again, that I have not forgotten your ines-
timable favors to me.”
Arriving on the eve of what everyone
expected would be a great battle, Mans-
field was completely unacquainted with his
hastily assembled staff. In the two days that
preceded the battle, he did not impress the
officers in his corps. Although well aware
of his reputation and struck by Mansfield’s
distinguished physical appearance, senior
division commander Brig. Gen. Alpheus S.
Williams described him in a letter to his
daughters as “a most veteran-looking offi-
cer, with head as white as snow,” but also
as “a most fussy, obstinate officer.” Mans-
field, for his part, seemed overwhelmed by
his responsibilities, and perhaps in com-
pensation intervened often in the move-
ment and deployment of brigades, regi-
ments, and batteries, bypassing the chain
of command and causing even more than
the normal confusion in the ranks.
The ordinary soldiers of the corps, how-
ever, had a distinctly positive reaction to
their new commander, whose genuine
enthusiasm and warm personality out-
weighed his apparent inexperience in lead-
ing combat troops. Hit hard during the Sec-
ond Bull Run campaign, the men needed
all the encouragement they could get.
Williams’s 1st Division had lost nearly all
its field officers, and its ranks were so
reduced that several of the old regiments
mustered only 100 men. Five new regi-
ments had been added, all green and barely
three weeks away from home. In the rapid
marches from Frederick, Maryland, many
had been lost to straggling and desertion.
Altogether, XII Corps numbered 12,soldiers, including noncombatants, and
contained 22 regiments of infantry and
three batteries of light artillery. It was the
smallest corps in the Army of the Potomac.
After receiving orders just after midnight
on September 17 to support Hooker in his
dawn attack, Mansfield’s men crossed Anti-
etam Creek via the upper bridge at 2 AM
and bivouacked on the Hoffman and Line
farms, about a mile behind Hooker’s left.
Because of the nearness of the enemy, the
men were ordered to lie down with their
arms; but few were able to sleep, including
the commander. Mansfield moved con-
stantly among his troops, waking Williams
several times with new directions before
finally spreading his blanket near a fence
corner close to the Line house, where he
was able to get a few hours of fitful sleep.
At the first explosion of cannon fire at
daybreak, Mansfield led his corps toward
the sounds of battle without waiting for
food or coffee. He had no idea what his
mission was—general support of Hooker,
exploitation of a breakthrough, or defense
against a possible Confederate counterat-
tack. McClellan had issued no specific
instructions. From the moment they started
to move, his men were under fire from four
batteries of Confederate artillery sited on
the plateau opposite the Dunker Church.
Slowed by the cannon fire, the advance was
even more confused because of Mansfield’s
frequent pauses for unit detachments and
reattachments, although none of the halts
was long enough to allow the men to boil
their much-needed coffee.
Reflecting attitudes developed over a life-
time in the Regular Army, Mansfield had
little confidence in the volunteers and
ordered his men deployed in “column of
regiments in mass.” In such a formation,
regiments were deployed 10 ranks deep,
instead of two ranks as in the conventional
line of battle. Williams’s division was on
the right and Greene’s was on the left, with
the line extending from farmer David R.
Miller’s house on the Hagerstown Pike
southeast across the Smoketown Road.
From the first, Mansfield seemed to be
everywhere, riding up and down the line,
shouting encouragement to his men andGET MORE CIVIL WAR AT
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