The First Battle of Bull Run occurred on 21 July 1861 in Prince William County, Virginia, just thirty miles southwest of Washington, D.C. and just north of the city of Manassas. This was the first major battle of the American Civil War, and it was the largest and bloodiest battle in U.S. history up to that point. The Federals and Confederates had different preferences for naming battles; whereas the Confederacy tended to name battles after the town that served as their base, Union armies named battles after a landmark closest to their own lines, usually a river or a stream. In this case, the North referred to the battle as ‘Bull Run’ (after the stream by the same name), and that name has stuck since the North was eventually victorious and had the privilege of writing the history. The Confederates called this battle the Battle of Manassas, and the ‘First’ was tagged onto the name after another battle was fought in the same area in 1862.
Just months after the fall of Fort Sumter near Charleston, South Carolina, the northern public clamored for a march against the Confederate capital of Richmond, Virginia. Capturing the Confederate capital, it was thought, would bring a decisive end to the Confederacy. The Union’s General-in-Chief, Winfield Scott, advocated caution; remembering the unprofessionalism of amateur troops during the War of 1812, he had reason to doubt the short-term enlisted soldiers were capable of a successful march and capture of Richmond. He suggested that the Union place a stranglehold on the Confederacy via a naval blockade and spend its time training up its new soldiers to proficiency before throwing them into the wolf’s lair. Scott’s so-called ‘Anaconda Plan’ would eventually be adopted, but in July of 1861, Lincoln felt it best to yield to public pressure: he ordered an advance into Virginia of Union troops under Brigadier General Irvin McDowell (pictured below and to the left). The Federals knew that the Confederates were camped nearby at Manassas Junction, where the Orange and Alexandria Railroad and the Manassas Gap Railroad met; the Confederates under P.T. Beauregard straddled the railroad, which was an artery connecting them with the Army of the Shenandoah.
Unbeknownst to McDowell, Beauregard (pictured below to the right) knew what he was up to. The year before, U.S. Army captain Thomas Jordan created a pro-Southern spy network in D.C. He recruited Rose O’Neal Greenhow, a well-connected socialite. He provided her with a code for messages and gave her control of his network before leaving D.C. to throw in with the Confederacy. Jordan’s spy network largely relied on southern belles riding fast horses, and Greenhow managed to evade Union pickets and deliver McDowell’s plans to Beauregard. Beauregard began preparing a defensive position along the Bull Run, a spring-fed muddy stream flowing southward through eastern Virginia.
That first day McDowell’s troops reached the town of Fairfax, Virginia. Nurse Edmunds remembered: ‘Some built fires while others went in search of, and appropriated, every available article which might in any way add to the comfort of hungry and fatigued men. The whole neighborhood was ransacked for milk, butter, eggs, poultry, etc… There might have been heard some stray shots fired in the direction of a field where a drove of cattle were quietly grazing; and soon after the odor of fresh steak was issuing from every part of the camp.’ Such raiding was contrary to McDowell’s orders, along with episodic barn-burning and vandalization that further soured the southern occupants against their Union occupiers. In a strange incidence, several soldiers pilfered female clothing, dressed themselves, and strutted around town to the tune of laughter from their compatriots. Union journalist George Wilkes was offended when ‘a fellow passed by with a pair of ladies’ ruffled drawers hauled up over his pantaloons.’ Upon reaching the town of Centreville the next day, McDowell scouted Beauregard’s enemy lines to the west. He was irritated to find that Bueauregard was well-entrenched on the opposite bank of Bull Run, with his left anchored on a stone bridge spanning the stream. Beuregard had congregated the bulk of his forces around the bridge and other fords so that any Union advance across Bull Run would be met with withering fire. A disgruntled McDowell would have to come up with a different plan of attack, and he had his eye on the Confederate left.
On 19-20 July, Johnston’s forces began reinforcing Beauregard. Johnston’s men had boarded trains at Piedmont Station and rode the tracks as fast as possible to Manassas Junction. This was the first time in history that troops had been transported to a battle by train. By the end of the 20th, most of Johnston’s men had reached the junction. Beauregard had been forming a plan in which the Confederates would surge across Blackburn’s Ford and push their way towards the Federals at Centreville. Johnston, as the senior officer between the two, approved the plan, and to this end he posted most of his Shenandoah men near Blackburn’s Ford. Thus both the Union and Confederacy, staring at each other across Virginia’s sluggish Bull Run, were planning attacks on each other; now it boiled down to which army made the first move, and that was McDowell’s.
In the early morning of 21 July, McDowell launched his attack: 12,000 men – the divisions of Hunter and Heintzelman – began the six-mile northwestern trek towards Sudley Springs that would, it was hoped, take them around the enemy’s left flank. At the same time Tyler’s division of 8,000 men left Centreville and aimed for the Stone Bridge. Having set off at 2:30A, in the dead of night long before the rising of the new day’s sun, the inexperienced troops almost immediately began fumbling. Tyler’s division blocked the advance of the flanking columns on the Warrenton Turnpike; when the flanking columns reached the roads that would take them to Sudley Springs, they discovered the ‘roads’ were just cart paths, making it difficult for the narrow files of soldiers to make good time, and even more difficult for the artillery and ambulances to make it from Point A to Point B without much cursing and struggling. As dawn began to break, Nurse Edmunds, accompanying ambulatory wagons towards Sudley Springs, remembered how ‘…column after column wounds its way over the green hills and through the hazy valleys, with the soft moonlight falling on the long lines of shining steel. Not a drum or bugle was heard during the march, and the deep silence was only broken by the rumbling of artillery, the muffled tread of infantry, or the low hum of thousands of subdued voices.’ New Yorker Edmund Clarence Stedman reflected, ‘The spirit of the soldiery was magnificent… There was glowing rivalry between the men of different states. “Old Massachusetts will not be ashamed of us tonight.” “Wait till the Ohio boys get at them.” “We’ll fight for New York today,” and a hundred similar utterances were shouted from the different ranks.’
Beauregard was eating breakfast at the Wilmer McLean house near Mitchell’s Ford when he heard the rumble of enemy artillery; moments later, a few rounds crashed through the house. A startled Beauregard realized the enemy was on the move, and he ordered demonstration attacks north towards the Union left at Centreville, hoping that this would blunt the Union advance until he could get a grasp of the situation.[1] Bungled orders and poor communications resulted in his subordinates receiving wrong information, no information, or mixed information, stunting the initial Confederate response. Meanwhile, Tyler’s men reached the Stone Bridge around six that morning, and the flanking divisions under Hunter and Heintzelman began fording Bull Run two miles upriver at an unguarded ford around 9:30A.
All that stood in the path of the Federal flanking columns at Sudley Spring was South Carolinian Colonel Nathan ‘Shanks’ Evans and his brigade of 1100 men guarding the Confederate left flank. Evans had won the ‘Shanks’ moniker at West Point as a mocking reference to his spindly legs, and he was known for having an orderly follow him around with a keg of whiskey he’d nicknamed ‘barrelito.’ Hours earlier he had dispatched some of his men towards the Stone Bridge upon learning that the Federals were there. Virginian Private John Goode, posted at the Stone Bridge, recounted: ‘Before sunrise… great clouds of dust might be seen… plainly indicating that the enemy were advancing; and soon the roar of heavy artillery was heard; shot and shell came screaming like lost spirits through the air; and the advancing hosts were momentarily expected to appear.’ Tyler’s men didn’t press forward across the bridge, indicating to Beauregard that Tyler was simply demonstrating to keep the Confederates away from the main attack. This was confirmed when his signal officer E.P. Alexander, stationed eight miles southwest at the Wilcoxen Farm on Signal Hill, telegrammed his superior that he had seen the glint of cannon barrels and bayonets moving beyond the Confederate left flank (this was the first use of wig-wag semaphore signaling in combat). Alexander told Beauregard, ‘Look out for your left, your position is turned.’ Evans reacted immediately, leading 900 of his men away from the Stone Bridge and down farm lanes to a new location on a low rise to the northwest called Matthews Hill.
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| the Stone Bridge at Bull Run where Tyler's men were posted |
The Struggle for Matthews Hill Charles Coffin of the Boston Journal was placed with Tyler’s men. He reported: ‘Looking south you could see clouds of dust floating over the forest trees. The Rebels have discovered the movement and are marching in hot haste [from several points along the Bull Run line] to resist the impending attack… Rebel officers ride furiously and shout their orders. The artillerymen lash their horses to a run. The infantry are also upon the run, sweating and panting in the hot sunshine.’ Evans was the vanguard of the Confederate response, but he knew his paltry 900 men didn’t stand a chance holding Matthews Hill against the Federals who outnumbered his men by twelve. Evans’ task was to halt or at least slow down the Union flanking movement until more southern forces could be shuffled into action against them.
As the first Union infantry began marching towards the slopes of Matthews Hill, Evans ordered a brazen counterattack. The honor of this day’s first ‘hot action’ fell to Major Roberdeau Wheat’s 1st Louisiana Battalion, known as ‘Wheat’s Tigers.’ Wheat anchored his left flank on Matthews Hill, and his men launched multiple attacks against the approaching Federals. A few days after the battle, a wounded Wheat remembered the morning’s events:
Having reached [the right of the line of battle on Matthews Hill], I moved by the left flank to an open field, a wood being on my left. From this cover, to my utter surprise, I received a volley of musketry which unfortunately came from our own troops, mistaking us for the enemy, killing three and wounding several of my men. Apprehending instantly the real cause of the accident, I called out to my own men not to return the fire. Those near enough to hear, obeyed; the more distant, did not. Almost at the same moment, the enemy in front opened upon us with musketry, grape, canister, round shot and shells. I immediately charged upon the enemy and drove him from his position. As he rallied again in a few minutes, I charged him a second and a third time successfully.’
Such episodes of friendly fire were common this early in the war, for several reasons. First, most soldiers were inexperienced, and in the ‘fog of war’ an amateur could easily fire into his fellow soldiers. Second, uniforms had not been standardized; accurate depictions of the battle will show a variety of uniforms for both North and South. Third, both armies carried similar-looking flags: the Federals carried the United States’ ‘stars and stripes’ flag, and the Confederates carried their ‘Stars and Bars,’ eleven stars on a blue field set in the corner of a flag with two red and one white horizontal bars. In the fog of war, these bars could be mistaken one for the other. Beauregard noticed this, and it led him to design a new battle flag with white stars embedded in a blue St. Andres’ Cross on a red field. [See the image to the right: from top to bottom we have the 1861 'Stars and Stripes' for the Union, the 1861 'Stars and Bars' for the Confederacy, and the upcoming Confederate 'Battle Flags' with St. Andrews' Cross.]
Charles Coffin had relocated from the Stone Bridge and joined the flanking columns at nearby Sudley Springs. He reported, as if watching it in real-time, ‘The Union troops at Sudley Springs move across the stream. Burnside’s brigade is in advance. The Second Rhode Island infantry is thrown out, deployed as skirmishers. The men are five paces apart. They move slowly, cautiously, and nervously through the fields and thickets. Suddenly, from bushes, trees, and fences there is a rattle of musketry… Evans’s skirmishers are firing. There are jets of flame and smoke, and a strange humming in the air. There is another rattle, a roll, a volley. The cannon join.’ Nurse Edmunds recounted, ‘Now the battle began to rage with terrible fury. Nothing could be heard save the thunder of artillery [and] the continuous roar of musketry. Oh, what a scene for the bright sun of a holy Sabbath morning to shine upon!’ Evans continued:
Advancing from the wood with a portion of my command, I reached some haystacks under cover of which I was enabled to damage the enemy very much… I was put [out of] combat by a Minie ball passing through my body and inflicting what was at first thought to be a mortal wound… Being left without a field officer, the companies rallied under their respective captains and, as you are aware, bore themselves gallantly throughout the day in the face of an enemy far outnumbering us.’
Reinforcements under Brigadier General Bernard Bee and Colonel Francis S. Bartow arrived at Matthews Hill shortly after Evans was wounded, bringing the paper total of southern forces to 2800 men against the Federal flanking columns. Evans’ fierce Tigers were thankful for the support. Confederate artillery unlimbered and began to ply their trade into the advancing Federals. Union Colonel Henry Slocum, spying the enemy artillery, rallied his men: ‘Come on, boys! Let us silence that battery – come strike for your country and for your God!’ His New Yorkers surged upslope towards the Confederate guns. Private William Westervelt described the moment: ‘Here I saw the first man killed, who was marching just in front of me was struck with grape shot over the left eye. He gave an unearthly screech and leaping into the air, came down on his hands and knees, and straightened out dead.’ For nearly two hours, the Confederates on Matthews Hill blunted the Federal advance. Hunter’s lead Union brigade, led by General Ambrose Burnside, suffered mightily. Regiments from New York, Rhode Island, and New Hampshire slugged it out with regiments from South Carolina, Louisiana, Alabama, Georgia, and Mississippi. Heintzelman was later noted by Confederates as ‘a gray-haired man, sitting sideways on horseback’ who displayed ‘coolness and gallantry’ as he ‘directed the movements of each [Union] regiment as it came up the hill.’ This was in stark contrast to other parts of the battlefield, where inexperienced Union officers didn’t coordinate their assaults but sent them in piecemeal. One Union soldier frightfully remembered how, on the slopes of the hill, he was ‘in the very presence of death.’ Charles Coffin gaped at the scene, and he later wrote (again as if witnessing it in real time): ‘Men fall. They are bleeding, torn, and mangled. The trees are splintered, crushed, and broken, as if smitten by thunderbolts. Twigs and leaves fall to the ground. There is smoke, dust, wild talking, shouting; hissings, howlings, explosions. It is a new, strange, unanticipated experience to the soldiers of both armies, far different from what they thought it would be.’
On a nearby hill between the Cub Run bridge and Centreville, journalists, reporters, well-to-do aristocratic statesmen, and curious civilians gathered to watch the fury on Matthews Hill from a safe distance. Howard Russell, a correspondent for the London Times (later dubbed ‘Bull Run Russell’) captured the scene:
[The] sounds which came upon the breeze and the sights which met our eyes were in terrible variance with the tranquil character of the landscape. The woods far and near echoed to the roar of cannon; and thin, frayed lines of blue smoke marked the spots whence came the muttering sound of rolling musketry… Clouds of dust shifted and moved through the forest, and I could see the gleam of arms and the twinkling of bayonets. On the hill beside me there was a crowd of civilians on horseback and in all sorts of vehicles, with a few of the fairer, if not gentler, sex… The spectators were all excited, and a lady with an opera glass who was near me was quite beside herself when an unusually heavy discharge roused the current of her blood: “This is splendid! Oh, my! Is not that first-rate? I guess we will be in Richmond this time tomorrow.”
At 10A, as Wheat’s Tigers were entrenching on Matthews Hill and getting ready to blunt the Federal advance, one of Tyler’s brigade commanders at the Stone Bridge, a relatively unknown colonel by the name of William Tecumseh Sherman, pushed his men across Bull Run at the Poplar (or Farm) Ford to approach the enemy on Matthews Hill from behind. Sherman’s audacious surprise attack, coupled with the pressure of the Union weight of numbers advancing from Sudley Springs, buckled the Confederate line. With Federals to the front and rapidly approaching the rear, the Confederates had no viable option but to withdraw to a second line of defense. A battery of four six-pounder cannon covered Evans’, Bee’s, and Bartow’s retreat south from Matthews Hill. James Tinham of Massachusetts remembered the moment: ‘We fired a volley, and saw the Rebels running. Then we were ordered to lie down and load. We aimed at the puffs of smoke we saw rising in front and on the left of us. The men were all a good deal excited. Our rear rank had singed the hair of the front rank, who were more afraid of them than of the Rebels. The next thing I remember was the order to advance, which we did under a scattering fire.’
As they retreated, New York regiments continued the chase and engaged the retreating southerners in brief hand-to-hand combat at the ‘Stone House’ just south of the hill and lying on Young’s Branch, a little tributary of Bull Run. At the same time, Confederates under Wade Hampton’s ‘Hampton Legion’ and General Thomas Jackson’s Virginians engaged the Federals around the buildings of the James Robinson farmstead; while the Federals under General Erasmus Keyes pushed the Confederates up the slopes of a larger hill known as Henry Hill, they did not press their advantage and allowed the Confederates to retreat to a cluster of buildings atop the hill. New York Lieutenant William Thompson Lusk, who belonged to a New York regiment under Sherman, was elated at the enemy retreat but overawed at the death and destruction around Matthews Hill and the Stone House:
From many a point not long since covered by secession forces, the American banner now floated. What wonder we felt our hearts swelling with pride, and saw, hardly noticing, horse and rider lying stiff, cold, and bloody together! What, though we stepped unthinking over the pale body of many a brave fellow still grasping convulsively his gun, with the shadows of Death closing around him! We were following the foe and dreaming only of victory.
The Struggle for Henry Hill The Federals who had tangled with the retreating Confederates at the Stone House didn’t pursue them across Young’s Branch. The exhausted southerners ascended the slopes of Henry Hill to find a piece of rest before the battle continued. Both sides were determining what to do next, and as councils of war took place, the wounded were carried back to their respective rears. J.C. Nott, a Confederate doctor, remembered: ‘My heart failed me as I saw load after load of our poor wounded and dying soldiers brought and strewed on the ground along the ravine where I was at work. Dr. Fanthray, who belonged to General Johnston’s staff, and myself were just getting fully to work when an old surgeon, whom I do not know, came to us and ordered us to fall back to another point with the wounded, as the battle would soon be upon us.’ Union observer Edwin S. Barret noted that there was ‘a continuous stream of wounded [being] carried past me to the rear. The soldiers would cross their muskets, place their wounded companions across, and slowly carry them past; another soldier would have a wounded man with his arm around his neck, slowly walking back; and then two men would be bearing a mortally wounded comrade in their arms, who was in convulsions and writing in his last agonies.’
Evans, Bee, and Bartow met with both Beauregard and Johnston atop Henry House Hill. Here were two old houses, one owned by a free black named James Robinson and the other by Mrs. Judith Henry (pictured here to the right). The Confederates stationed themselves at the ‘Henry House,’ for the Robinson homestead lie too close to the Federals at Bull Run. While the Union infantry took a breather at the bottom of Henry Hill, Union artillery began entrenching themselves on Dogan Hill to the northwest; here they would be able to fire into the Confederate masses. Brigadier Thomas Jackson, having extricated himself from Keyes at the Robinson House, joined the Confederate leadership gaggle along with Colonel J.E.B. Stuart and Wade Hampton’s ‘Hampton Legion’[2]. Meanwhile, Union batteries under commanders Ricketts and Griffin were ordered to support positions that exposed them to enemy fire. Coffin remembered that ‘[Captain] Ricketts does not like the order, but he is a soldier in the regular army and believes in obeying commands. The battery ascends the hill towards the Henry house and opens fire at close range. Griffin comes, with his horses upon the gallop [and] takes position to the left of Ricketts.’
As the Union batteries began moving into position, Sherman’s brigade began pushing against Henry Hill. Hampton’s Legion rushed forward to stunt his advance. Sherman’s 79th New York was decimated by the southern musketry and began to fall apart (it’s known that Hampton had purchased 400 Pattern 1853 Enfield rifles, but it’s unknown if his men had them for this battle; if they did, it would explain the decimation of the New Yorkers). At one point Wade Hampton gestured towards his enemy combatant James Cameron, Colonel of the 79th New York, and told his men, ‘Look at that brave officer trying to lead his men, and they won’t follow him.’ Cameron was the brother of Simon Cameron, the U.S. Secretary of War. Cameron suffered a fatal wound shortly after Hampton’s remark, and it’s rumored that Hampton deliberately targeted officers of the 79th to avenge the death of his nephew earlier that day at the hands of New Yorkers (those offenders, however, belonged to the 69th New York, not the 79th). William Thompson Lusk of the 79th New York wrote to his mother of the approach to Henry House Hill:
What wonder we felt our hearts swelling with pride, and saw, hardly noticing, horse and rider lying stiff, cold and bloody together! What, though we stepped unthinking over the pale body of many a brave fellow still grasping convulsively his gun, with the shadows of Death closing around him! We were following the foe, I have said, and were dreaming only of victory. So we were marched to the edge of a slope which sheltered us partially from the aim of the enemy’s artillery. Here lying prostrate, shell after shell flew over our heads, or tore up the ground around. Now we could feel the hot breath of a cannon ball fan our cheeks; now we could see one fairly aimed, falling among our horses, and rolling them prostrate; and now again one of these messengers would come swift into the ranks of one of our columns, and without a thought or a groan, a soul was hurried into eternity.
As Hampton and Sherman were trading blows, Jackson placed his artillery just 300 yards from those of Ricketts and Griffin, and they immediately turned their fire on the limbered Union cannons that were moving to their new positions. Southern Captain John D. Imboden was ordered by Jackson to ride ‘from battery to battery’ to ensure that the guns were properly aimed and the fuses cut to the right length. He recounts:
This was the work of but a few minutes. On returning to the left of the line of guns, I stopped to ask General Jackson’s permission to rejoin my battery. [Jackson was astride his horse.] The fight was just then hot enough to make him feel well. His eyes fairly blazed. He had a way of throwing up his left hand with the open palm toward the person he was addressing. And as he told me to go, he made this gesture. The air was full of flying missiles, and he jerked down his hand, and I saw that blood was streaming from it. I exclaimed, “General, you are wounded!” He replied, as he drew a handkerchief from his breastpocket and began to bind it up, “Only a scratch – a mere scratch,” and galloped away along his line.’
Jackson later wrote: ‘Although under a heavy fire for several continuous hours, I received only one wound, the breaking of the longest finger of my left hand. My horse was wounded, but not killed.’ He ordered his men to dig in on the reverse slope of Henry Hill, where they were protected from direct fire. He placed thirteen cannon on the crest of the hill, and as the guns fired, their recoil pushed them downslope where they could be safely reloaded and pushed back into place. McDowell ordered his artillery on Dogan Hill to move to Matthews Hill. Soon enough eleven Union guns were dueling with Jackson’s thirteen. The smoothbore Confederate cannons had an advantage against the rifled Union cannons at such short range, as many Union rounds went well over the heads of their targets. Imboden recounted the duel:
More than half our horses had been killed. Those that we had were quickly divided among the guns and caissons, and we limbered up and fled. Then it was that the Henry House was riddled [for] our line of retreat was chosen so that the house would conceal us from Griffin’s battery, and, in a measure, shelter us from the dreaded fire of the infantry when they should reach the crest we had just abandoned. Several of Griffin’s shot passed through the house, scattering shingles, boards, and splinters all around us.
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| the Federal advance on Henry House Hill |
The Union infantry advanced beneath the storm of crisscrossing cannonballs overhead, and the cordon began to tighten around the Henry Hill House. New Yorkers, Minnesotans, and the U.S. Marine Corps Battalion stormed uphill towards Jackson’s Virginians. His stalwart Virginians entrenched themselves and prepared to trade volleys. The weight of the Federals began to show, and Brigadier General Bee exclaimed to Jackson, ‘The enemy are driving us!’ Jackson coolly reported, ‘Then, sir, we will give the bayonet.’ According to legend, Bee exhorted his own troops to look to Jackson: ‘There is Jackson standing like a stone wall! Let us determine to die here, and we will conquer! Rally behind the Virginians!’ Bee’s exclamation is believed to be the source for Jackson’s (and his brigade’s) nickname: ‘Stonewall Jackson and his Stonewall Brigade.’ However, some are doubtful, and Bee never got a chance to clarify his intentions: shortly after rallying the troops, he was gut-shot and succumbed to his wounds the next day. It’s interesting that none of Bee’s contemporaries mentioned the exchange, and Major Burnett Rhett, Johnston’s Chief of Staff, alleged that Bee was furious with Jackson for failing to come to him, Evans’, and Bartow’s relief when they were retreating from Matthews Hill (Bartow died that afternoon from wounds sustained in battle). Per Rhett, one could argue – and many historians have! – that Bee’s exclamation was not one of star-struck awe but of sarcastic mockery: while he should’ve been moving to aid his fellow countrymen, here he was just standing still as stone! Whichever interpretation one takes, this reality is undeniable: Jackson’s brigade suffered more casualties than any other southern brigade this day.
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| Thomas Jackson leading his Virginians |
As the Federals tightened the noose around the hill, the fighting became vicious and close-quarter. Charles Coffin recounts: ‘There is not much order. Regiments are scattered. The lines are not even. There are a great many stragglers on both sides… The artillery crashes louder than before. There is a continuous rattle of musketry. There are desperate hand-to-hand encounters. Hundreds fall, and other hundreds leave the ranks.’ The Union observer Edwin S. Barrett, sitting among the upper branches of a persimmon tree, had an eagle’s-eye view of the battlefield as the Union lines closed with those of the Confederacy:
I had an unobstructed view of the whole line, and I could see into the enemy’s intrenchments, where the men looked like so many bees in a hive; and I could plainly see their officers riding about, and their different columns moving hither and thither. Their batteries on the right and left were masked with trees so completely that I could not distinguish them except by the flash from their guns. The valley in front of the enemy’s works was filled with our infantry, extending to some patches of woods on our right. Our batteries were placed on various eminences on the flank and rear, shifting their positions from time to time. The fire from our lines in this valley was terrific, and as they kept slowly advancing, firing, retreating to load, and then advancing again, it was a sight which no words could describe.
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Union Captain Griffin moved two of his guns to the southern end of the Federal line with the hope of providing enfilading fire against the enemy. At around 3P, Jackson’s 33rd Virginian advanced on the guns. Jackson’s men wore blue uniforms, which were common with the Federals, so that Griffin’s commander believed them to be Union troops and ordered Griffin not to fire on them. Thus the guns remained silent as the Federals approached. The cannoneers suffered momentary confusion as they watched the approaching blue-coated soldiers form into a battle line. A member of Griffin’s battery captures the moment the confusion passed: ‘[There] came a tremendous explosion of musketry, and all was confusion. Wounded men were clinging to caissons, to which were attached frightened and wounded horses. I saw three horses galloping off, dragging a fourth, which was dead. The dead cannoneers lay with the rammers, sponges, and lanyards still in their hands. The battery was annihilated by those volleys in a moment.’ Many of the New York ‘Fire Zouaves’ supporting Griffin’s battery were slain along with several gunners. The stunned Federals were preparing to counterstrike when J.E.B. Stuart’s saber-wielding cavalry arrived onto the scene and pushed themselves into the battery, slashing and cutting and generally sowing chaos. William Lusk of the 79th New York remembered the scene:
After about an hour in this trying position, we were called up and turned into the road, where Death began to make sad havoc in our ranks. Surely aimed, the shot of the enemy fell among us. We could not see the foe, and then it was terrible to see our own boys, whose faces we knew, and whose hands we had pressed, falling in Death agony. We heard, while marching stealthily, a great shout, and looking we saw a hill before us, covered with the Ellsworth Zouaves. A moment more, and from the top of the hill, from unseen hands blazed a terrible discharge of arms. It was one of those masked batteries, which have so often brought us misfortune. Bravely fought the Zouaves, but they had to fall back from that hellish fire. Other Regiments made the charge but only to be repulsed with ranks thinned and broken. At length our turn came. Up we rushed—our brave Colonel with us. The first fire swept our ranks like a quick darting pestilence. “Rally, boys—Rally!” shouted the officers, and a brave rally was made. Our men stood firmly firing, answering volley by volley. Here we felt the worthlessness of our old Harper’s Ferry muskets, when matched against the rifles of the enemy.
Jackson’s men captured Griffin’s guns, but a Federal counterattack pushed them back. The Federals recaptured their guns, much to the dismay of the Confederates. Beauregard, fearing that their demoralization would sap their strength and resolve, ‘rode up and down [the] lines, between the enemy and his own men, regardless of the heavy fire, cheering and encouraging [the] troops’ (per the Richmond Dispatch). Beauregard launched a counter-attack with Jackson’s brigade in the center. They recaptured the guns, and Beauregard remembered how ‘Jackson’s brigade pierced the enemy’s center with the determination of veterans and the spirit of men who fight for a sacred cause; but it suffered seriously. With equal spirit the other parts of the line made the onset, and the Federal lines were broken and swept back at all points from the open ground of the plateau. Rallying soon, however, the Federalists returned, and by weight of numbers pressed our lines back, recovered their ground and guns, and renewed the offensive.’ Beauregard then ‘ordered forward the whole line, which, at this crisis of the battle, I felt called upon to lead in person. The whole open ground was again swept clear of the enemy, and the plateau around the Henry and Robinson houses remained finally in our possession, with the greater part of the Ricketts and Griffin batteries and a flag of the 1st Michigan regiment, captured by Jackson’s brigade.’
This penultimate fighting on Henry House Hill was brutal and often hand-to-hand. It was during this struggle that Jackson told soldiers of the 4th Virginia Infantry, ‘Reserve your fire until they come within fifty yards! Then fire and give them the bayonet! And when you charge, yell like furies!’ This is one of the first times that Union troops heard the disturbing ‘Rebel Yell,’ here described by a northern soldier: ‘There is nothing like [the rebel yell] on this side of the infernal region. The peculiar corkscrew sensation that it sends down your backbone under these circumstances can never be told. You have to feel it.’ A Virginian noted of this fighting around the Henry House that ‘The shouts of the combatants, the groans of the wounded and dying and the explosion of shells made a complete pandemonium…the atmosphere was black with the smoke of the battle.’ A Wisconsin soldier told of how the bodies were stacked in a roadway ditch: ‘The poor fellows had crowded in and crawled one upon another, filling the ditch in some places three or four deep…I will not sicken you with a description of the road.’ William Lusk captured the moment the Federals broke under the weight of the Confederates:
Tall men were mowed down about me. Wounded men begged their comrades to press on, and not to risk anything by lingering near them. We were only some twenty yards from a battery, belching forth a thick heavy hail of grape and canister, shell and fire of musketry. With unerring accuracy the enemy’s riflemen singled out our officers and mighty men. Suddenly we saw the American flag waving over the battery. “Cease firing” was the order given, and for a short moment we believed the battery was ours. It was the enemy though that had raised the flag to deceive us. As we lowered our arms, and were about to rally where the banner floated, we were met by a terrible raking fire, against which we could only stagger. “By the Lord, but I believe them coons’s too cunning for us!” cried an old soldier near me. We halted, fell bac k, and the hillside was left to such only as lingered to bear away their wounded comrades. As we passed down we saw our Colonel lying still, in the hands of Death. He had fallen bravely, breast to the foe, not wishing to cherish his own life, while the lives of his men were imperiled. Over the sad disheartening retreat let us not linger—let it be covered by the darkness of the night which followed.
The Union Retreat
The seesaw fighting on Henry Hill ended with the Confederates retaining hold of the hill as the Federals retreated downslope towards Young’s Branch. To the southwest of Henry Hill, Union Colonel Oliver O. Howard hoped to gain a toehold on a prominence known as Chinn Ridge. McDowell hoped this toehold could be a launching point to push forces around the Confederate left flank. However, Howard was opposed by two just-arriving brigades from the Shenandoah, one led by Colonel Jubal Early and the other by Brigadier General Kirby Smith. These forces were well-rested and itching for a fight, and as they charged Howard on Chinn Ridge, Howard realized his winded and beleaguered troops wouldn’t be able to stand against them. Beauregard, seeing the Federals falling back from Chinn Ridge and Henry Hill, ordered the entire Confederate line forward. As the southerners gave a rebel yell and surged downslope after the retreating enemy, the Federals – exhausted from marching or fighting for fourteen hours, hungry and thirsty on a brutally hot and humid July day, and many whose three-month enlistments were about to expire – completely broke. In large and small groups, and as individuals, unit integrity disintegrated as they began fleeing east towards the Union camp at Centreville.
McDowell rode around the field and tried to rally the soldiers, but most had had enough. McDowell could read the writing on the wall: the day was over, and the Union had lost. Hoping to salvage something from the debacle, he ordered Colonel Andrew Porter’s regular U.S. Infantry (not militia or volunteers) to hold the intersection at the Warrenton Turnpike and the Manassas-Sudley Road as a rearguard. Porter remembered how ‘the slopes were swarming with our retreating and disorganized forces, while riderless horses and artillery teams ran furiously through the flying crowd. All further efforts were futile. The words, gestures, and threats of our officers were thrown away upon men who had lost all presence of mind, and only longed for absence of body.’ Another body of men under Union Major George Sikes positioned themselves at a critical ridge close to the Stone Bridge. His battalion formed a square and defended the ridge against Confederate infantry and cavalry until all the fleeing Federals had crossed the bridge. Sykes’ battalion then crossed the bridge in good order. Days later, when President Lincoln reviewed the Federal troops at D.C., an army commander pointed out the battalion and said to Lincoln, ‘These are the men who saved your army.’ Lincoln coolly replied, ‘Yes, I have heard of them.’
The holding actions of both Porter and Sykes are the gems of the Union retreat; whereas their actions prompted honor and gratitude, the rest of the army was an embarrassment – and there was no hiding it. First Bull Run has also been called the ‘Picnic Battle’ because the wealthy elite of D.C., including statesmen and their families (among them children), had come to picnic and watch the battle from a distance. They anticipated an easy victory, and they intended to celebrate with picnic baskets and opera glasses. Captain John Tidball wrote:
They came in all manner of ways, some in stylish carriages, others in city hacks, and still others in buggies, on horseback and even on foot. Apparently, everything in the shape of vehicles in and around Washington had been pressed into service for the occasion. It was Sunday and everybody seemed to have taken a general holiday; that is all the male population, for I saw none of the other sex there, except a few huckster women who had driven out in carts loaded with pies and other edibles. All manner of people were represented in this crowd, from the gravest and noble senators to hotel waiters.
When the Federals were forced to retreat, the roads became blocked by panicked civilians attempting to flee in their gilded carriages. One congressman noted that ‘the further [the Union soldiers ran], the more frightened they grew.’ A correspondent for the New York Tribune wrote, ‘All sense of manhood seemed to be forgotten. Even the sentiment of shame had gone. Every impediment to flight was cast aside. Rifles, bayonets, pistols, haversacks, cartridge-boxes, canteens, blankets, belts, and overcoats littered the road.’ One bridge was made impassable by overturned wagons; Colonel Burnside recounted, ‘Upon the bridge crossing Cub Run a shot took effect upon the horses of a team that was crossing. The wagon was overturned directly in the center of the bridge, and the passage was completely obstructed. The enemy continued to play his artillery upon the carriages, ambulances, and artillery wagons that filled the road, and these were reduced to ruin. The infantry, as the files reached the bridge, were furiously pelted with a shower of grape and other shot, and several persons were here killed or dangerously wounded.’ Edmund Stedman of the New York World wrote, ‘Horses, many of them in death agony [from battlefield wounds], galloped at random forward. Those on foot who could catch them rode them bareback, as much to save themselves from being run over as to make quicker time. Wounded men lying along the banks appealed with raised hands to those who rode horses, but few regarded such petitions.’ A Confederate shell destroyed Senator Henry Wilson’s buggy, and he had to mount a mule to escape. Iowa Senator James Grimes was nearly captured and vowed never to go near a battlefield again; New York representative Alfred Ely was not so fortunate: he was captured as a prisoner of war and sent to Richmond.Michigan senator Zachariah Chandler tried to stem the Union retreat by blocking the road, but he was bodily shoved out of the way. Senator Ben Wade of Ohio picked up a discarded rifle and threatened to shoot any soldier who ran. He remembered:
We called to them, tried to tell them there was no danger, called them to stop, implored them to stand. We called them cowards, denounced them in the most offensive terms, put out our heavy revolvers, and threatened to shoot them, but all in van; a cruel, crazy, mad, hopeless panic possessed them, and communicated to everybody about in front and rear. The heat was awful, although now about six; the men were exhausted – their mouths gaped, their lips cracked and blackened with the powder of the cartridges they had bitten off in battle, their eyes starting in frenzy; no mortal ever saw such a mass of ghastly wretches.
The pell-mell retreat became known as ‘The Great Skedaddle’ in the southern press. Confederate President Jefferson Davis arrived at the battlefield just as the Federals were fleeing east. He had chartered a special train, obtained a horse near Manassas, and rode with an aide that afternoon towards the battle. Pushing through a flood of wounded southerners, he was exhorted to go back; ‘We’re whipped!’ he was told. Davis pushed on, knowing that the rear of a battlefield – with its stragglers, its cowards, its dead and its maimed – was the same for both victors and losers. Once Davis found Johnston, Johnston was elated with news of the triumph. Davis urged him to send his men after the fleeing northerners, but Johnston didn’t think his men had it in him; he later justified this, saying, ‘Our army was more disorganized by victory than that of the United States by defeat.’ In D.C., Lincoln and his cabinet received a telegram stating ‘General McDowell’s army in full retreat through Centreville. The day is lost. Save Washington and the remnants of the army.’ Happier tidings reached Richmond; Davis telegraphed, ‘We have won a glorious but dear-bought victory. Night closed on the enemy in full flight and closely pursued.’ This last bit was propaganda, as the Confederates did not chase their enemy out of Virginia. [3 and 4]
Postscript
By midnight in D.C., officers and civilians who had been fortunate enough to find horses began arriving in the city. Presidential Secretary John Nicolay recounted: ‘It was a gloomy night, but yet gloomier days followed. Next day, Monday, the rain commenced falling… Through this rain the disbanded soldiers began to pour into Washington City, fagged out, hungry, and dejected, and having literally nowhere to turn their feet or lay their head.’ He added: ‘History owes a page of honorable mention to the Federal capital on this occasion. The rich and poor, the high and low of her loyal people, opened their doors and dealt out food and refreshments to the footsore, haggard, and half-starved men so unexpectedly reduced to tramps and fugitives.’ The same day that the Federals were routed from the battlefield, the U.S. House of Representatives, in a special session, unanimously passed the following resolution:
Resolved, That the maintenance of the Constitution, the preservation of the Union, and the enforcement of the laws, are sacred trusts which must be executed; that no disaster shall discourage us from the most ample performance of this high duty; and that we pledge to the country and the world the employment of every resource, national and individual, for the suppression, overthrow, and punishment of rebels in arms.
Despite the bombastic pledge to overthrow ‘rebels in arms,’ panic gripped the capital. 14,000 Confederate forces were just thirty miles away, and little stood to oppose them. On 24 July Professor Thaddeus S.C. Lowe took up his hot air balloon Enterprise to see what the Confederates were up to. The Enterprise was built with Indian silk, lightweight cording, and Lowe’s patent varnish (a secret recipe) which could keep the balloon envelope gassed up for as long as two weeks. In his first flight, as he tried to land in the Union encampment, he was rebuffed by Union soldiers (he didn’t have any military insignia on the balloon, and they didn’t know if he was friend or foe); Lowe was forced to land his balloon behind enemy lines. Fortunately, he was rescued overnight before the enemy could find him. The Enterprise was badly damaged, but his exploits were impressive enough that he was given the green light to build a proper balloon. The Union was delighted to hear that it did not appear as if the Confederates were planning an attack.
The battle at Bull Run convinced both sides that the war would be longer and costlier than originally thought. On 22 July, the day after the battle, Lincoln signed a bill that funded the enlistment of another 500,000 men for up to three years of service; three days later 11,000 Pennsylvanians who had been rejected for federal service were gladly accepted. The U.S. Joint Committee on the Conduct of the War was a congressional body created to investigate northern military affairs, and it was created in the wake of the battle. Though the Committee concluded that the Union defeat was best attributed to Patterson failing to keep Johnston bottled up in Winchester, Patterson’s enlistment had expired, and there was nothing that could be done to him. The people needed a scapegoat, and McDowell was it: he was relieved of his command three days after the battle, on 25 July, and replaced by George B. McClellan, who would soon be named General-in-Chief of all Union armies. The demoted McDowell remained in the army, and in an unfortunate twist of irony, he would bear significant blame for the Union defeat by General Robert E. Lee at the Second Battle of Manassas on 28-30 August 1862. McDowell has gotten a bad rap for his defeat, but at the end of the day, his plan was a good one, and the actions he took during the battle were wise; his defeat had more to do with ill-trained and undisciplined troops coupled with bad luck.
[1] The Wilmer McLean house sat on Wilmer McLean’s farm near Manassas, Virginia. Following the battle he would relocate to the southwest at Appomatox. In a fun twist of fate, the first major land engagement of the Civil War began with cannon-balls through his first home, and in 1865 the war ended when Confederate General Robert E. Lee surrendered to Union General U.S. Grant in the parlor of his second home. The war ‘started and ended’ on his threshold.
[2] The Hampton Legion was a brigade of infantry, cavalry, and artillery organized and partially financed by the wealthy South Carolina planter Wade Hampton III.
[3] The Union forces were commanded by Irvin McDowell, and the forces consisted of the U.S. Army of Northern Virginia and U.S. Marines. McDowell’s forces numbered 35,700 on paper, but only 18,000 were engaged. His army was organized into five infantry divisions of 3-5 brigades each; each brigade consisted of 3-5 infantry regiments, and each brigade was generally assigned an artillery battle. The Federals suffered 2708 casualties: 481 killed, 1011 wounded, and 1216 missing.
[4] The Confederate forces were commanded by Joseph E. Johnston and P.G.T. Beauregard. Johnston commanded the Army of the Shenandoah, and Beauregard commanded the Army of the Potomac; between the two, Johnston was the superior officer. The Confederate forces numbered between 32,000 and 34,000 on paper, but only 18,000 were engaged. Johnston’s Army of the Shenandoah was organized into four brigades, and each brigade consisted of 3-5 regiments and an artillery battery. J.E.B. Stuart’s cavalry numbered 300 men and had twenty pieces of artillery. Beauregard’s Army of the Potomac was organized into seven infantry brigade, and each brigade consisted of 3-6 infantry regiments. Artillery batteries were attached to select brigades. The Confederates suffered far fewer casualties than the attacking Federals: total casualties amount to 1982, with 387 killed, 1582 wounded, and 13 missing.
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