Army of Northern Virginia

~~ 6^th Alabama Infantry Unit History~~

The Battle of Seven Pines/ Fair Oaks (May 30 - June 1, 1862)

Seven Pines or Fair Oaks Virginia (May 30 - June 1, 1862), The 6^th Alabama Regiment took a prominent part holding the right along White Oak Swamp, losing 102 killed and 282 wounded out of 632 engaged (59%). The brigade lost 1296 out of about 2500 engaged.

The Federals had pushed the Confederate Army since their last full meeting at Williamsburg until they were within 5 miles east of Richmond. For a lot of reasons we will not go into here, General McClellan split the Army of the Potomac. Two-thirds was on the north side of the Chickahominy River and the other third pushing down the Williamsburg road to Richmond. General Keyes IV Corp was in the lead and determined they had meet the Confederate Army just west of Seven Pines began to dig in just on the western edge of the small cross roads hamlet.

Richmond-and indeed the entire Confederacy-was in a state of near panic. Refugees filled the roads leading south and west with hundreds of wagons. Tobacco and cotton burned on the wharf's by the James River and what was not burning was stacked around Richmond ready to be burned. Two regiments of militia drilled on the State Fairgrounds as though their antiquated muskets could turn back l00,000 Yankees if the army failed. Governor John Letcher toured the Virginia regiments in Johnston's army, exhorting them to die instead of retreat, while Richmond's aged Mayor Joseph Mayo swore at public rallies that he would resign his office and shoulder a rifle rather than desert his city.

The Battle of Seven Pines really started during the night of Friday, May 30, 1862 when one of the major actors, the weather, chose to show its hand. A thunder, lightning and rain storm of frightening proportions play across the area, flooding the soon to be battleground so that there was very little ground left that was not covered with water. Soldiers spent the night standing or sitting to keep from drowning. "Throughout all the night of the 30th of May," said Erasmus Keyes, "there was raging a storm the like to which I cannot remember. Torrents of rain drenched the earth, the thunderbolts rolled and fell without intermission, and the heavens flashed with perpetual blaze of lightning. An officer in Hooker's Division recalled that the lightning neither flashed nor cracked, but blazed in "sheets of flame which enveloped whole bivouacs in eerie glow." He also described the "electric fire" that skipped along the lines of stacked muskets, "tipping the points of the bayonets with flame, like jets of gas. Across the lines, to a soldier of the 4th North Carolina," it seemed as if heaven and earth were being torn to pieces, while the rain came down in torrents....

Johnston's tactical concept hinged on the convergence of the Williamsburg and Nine-Mile Roads at Seven Pines. Simultaneous attacks along both should crack Keyes's line (See Map 1). But the only troops currently stationed on the Williamsburg Road were those of D. H. Hill. Both Hill and his men had been seasoned at Williamsburg, yet one division did not appear to have enough weight to carry Casey's first line by itself. Theoretically, Hill's division was composed of five brigades; in fact, on May 30 he had only three on the Williamsburg Road. Brigadier General Robert Rodes's Alabama-Mississippi-Virginia Brigade sat several miles further south on the Charles City Road, probing for the Yankee left flank. Hill's fifth brigade was a makeshift organization of remnants of companies of the shattered Wise (Virginia) Legion and heavy artillerymen from the Richmond defenses, presided over by former Virginia Governor turned-brigadier general Henry Wise. This brigade's usefulness was doubtful, and by the afternoon of May 30 it had yet to move up from Richmond. The three brigades Hill had in hand accounted for less than 10,000 men.

Quite possibly it was Longstreet who suggested a partial answer: bring Huger's division over to the Charles City Road from Drewry's Bluff to relieve Rodes. Longstreet had personally inspected the James River fortifications a few days earlier, and knew that, when Huger moved, a garrison of about 1,000 artillerymen, sailors, and marines would be sufficient to repulse any attempt by Union gunboats to steam up the river to Richmond. Huger's presence on the Charles City Road would bring Hill's strength up to four brigades, protect his flank, and even create the possibility of a third converging attack on the Federals. Johnston immediately agreed."

Could Hill be strengthened even more? They examined the possibility. Encamped along either the Nine Mile Road or the nearby Chickahominy were the other three divisions earmarked for the attack: Longstreet's, Whiting's, and McLaws's. Given the closed character of the ground, all fifteen of these brigades could hardly be expected to deploy simultaneously for the attack. Perhaps a division could be shifted to the Williamsburg Road. If so, logic and army politics dictated that this division would be Longstreet's. McLaws could hardly disengage from his covering position along the river long enough to march ten or fifteen miles without arousing Federal suspicion. If Whiting were sent, G. W. Smith might assert his seniority and take overall command on the Williamsburg Road.

This plan would have opened the battle with three brigades on the Charles City Road, ten on the Williamsburg Road, and nine on the Nine-Mile Road, nicely balancing the two main prongs of the assault. Unfortunately, there was an inherent logistical difficulty with it. Trying to move Huger up from Drewry's Bluff and Longstreet down from the Nine Mile Road would require nine brigades to share the small stretch of the Williamsburg Road which both divisions would have to traverse before Huger turned southeast on the Charles City Road. Such a movement would not only have to be carefully planned to bring it off at all, it would have to be conducted entirely in the dark if a dawn attack was contemplated. Johnston reluctantly overruled the idea.

In the end Johnston decided that the simplest plan would be best under the circumstances. During the night Huger would march down the Charles City Road to relieve Rodes. (See Map 2) Rodes's Brigade would then strike north across White Oak Swamp and rejoin Hill on the Williamsburg Road; his arrival would inform Hill that his flank was secure and that the battle could begin. As he attacked down the Williamsburg Road, Hill was to fire off signal cannon to alert Longstreet's forces on the Nine Mile Road. As a precaution against Hill's impulsive nature, he was directed in writing "abatis and entrenched positions were ordered to be taken by a flank movement of the brigade or brigades in front of them" rather than by frontal assault. At the sound of Hill's guns, Longstreet would join the offensive with his six brigades, supported by Whiting. Johnston would remain posted near the old house where the Nine Mile Road turned southeast, controlling Longstreet's reinforcements and watching for Federal troops crossing the Chickahominy to reinforce Keyes. These he would engage with McLaws's division if necessary."

For the battle to begin on schedule, three things had to happen. Huger must make it on time to relieve Rodes on the Charles City road. Hill's signal guns must be audible two miles away if the Nine Mile Road attack was to be properly coordinated. Any troops McClellan pushed across the river to reinforce Seven Pines must be observed and then turned back. There were a great many blocks over which the army might stumble.

Hill, the caustic Tarheel expected to attack at dawn, as soon as Rodes's Brigade marched out of White Oak Swamp and into the line of battle. His other three brigades, commanded by George B. Anderson, Samuel Garland, and Gabriel J. Rains, crouched silently in the woods alongside the road, impatient to advance. Two cannon had been deployed to fire the signal that would launch the assault. Hill paced and waited for Rodes to arrive.

The sun rose and the fog began to burn off. Still there was no sign of Rodes. Growing anxious, Hill started dispatching couriers to determine the cause of the delay. By 9:00a.m.he knew that Huger's division had not relieved his flanking brigade, (Rodes' Brigade) and in fact had not even turned onto the Charles City Road. There was, however, a huge knot of troops congregated at Gillie's Creek on the Williamsburg Road, just east of the Charles City turnoff. Hill leapt into his saddle and rode to find out what the problem was.

The tangle of troops had been partially created by the downpour that had inundated eastern Virginia the night before. This was the storm that Johnston would later assert gave him the best chance to destroy half the Union army, and the claim seemed logical. Union rifle pits began to fill up with water. The layers of sand and clay which composed the roads between the dispersed Federal divisions quickly became saturated and the thoroughfares degenerated into bottomless mud holes. Streams overflowed their banks and smaller bridges disappeared during the night. The logs laid to corduroy the road between Sumner's II Corps and the troops south of the Chickahominy slowly worked loose and started to float away.

Unfortunately for the Confederates, this morass of slick brown mud was not confined to the Yankee side of the line. White Oak Swamp, through which Rodes would later have to pass, flooded four to five feet deep. Both the Williamsburg and Nine-Mile Roads turned liquid. Worse, the bridge over Gillie's Creek washed out. It was this bridge that both Huger and Longstreet had to cross under the revised plan. The Georgian's men arrived first, even though Huger's brigades had been on the march since 3:00 A.M. Faced with this obstacle, the soldiers improvised quickly, albeit somewhat impracticably. A wagon was pulled out into the creek and two planks were thrown across it, spanning the distance between the banks. Balancing weapons and haversacks, Longstreet's six brigades began to traverse the makeshift bridge more than 10,000 men in single file. This was the situation when Huger's leading brigade arrived.

At the Poe house Hill found much to his consternation, not Huger's Division, but Longstreet's. Hill knew already that Longstreet had modified Johnston's original plan, but he would hardly have expected to find Longstreet' division in the lead. This made no sense: Huger had further to march in order to replace Rodes, and Longstreet could have easily followed him across the creek and arrived behind Hill's division prior to the attack.

Huger knew he was on trial in this operation. He had only survived in the face of nearly universal vilification after Roanoke Island because the president had no love what so ever for Henry Wise. If he failed to get his men up to relieve Rodes on time, he could reasonably predict that his career as a field commander would soon come to a crashing end. So when he found Longstreet's brigades blocking his own at Gillie's Creek, he immediately demanded to know where he could find the Georgian's headquarters.

There he found not only Longstreet but also the impatient Hill. Hill appears to have said little at this meeting: despite his aggressive nature he was fully aware that he was the junior officer present. Aside from rank considerations, there was also the volume of the conversation to consider. Both Huger and Longstreet suffered from significant hearing loss, and probably had to do a great deal of shouting back and forth to be understood.

Huger claimed precedence for his division at the bridge. The demand was reasonable, because Longstreet's division was operating on a far less stringent timetable. If Longstreet's troops traversed the stream first, their passage would so delay Huger that the battle might not start until several more hours had passed. Johnston's planned dawn attack would become a noon assault. Nonetheless, Longstreet refused. Two considerations prompted this rather illogical act. First, the Georgian had been caught off guard by Huger's arrival. When he had recast Johnston's original plan, it seems never to have occurred to him that the two divisions might collide at the creek. Having carefully constructed his reputation as the battlefield commander who did not lose control, Longstreet had no intention of admitting a mistake so grave before the battle had even begun. His division was already partly across the bridge; he told Huger to have his men fall out by the road and wait.

This sequence of events rendered the combative Hill apoplectic. He had been waiting all morning for the reinforcements his superiors considered necessary for him to strike his blow, only to discover that the battle would be further delayed, and that his reinforcements would only amount to two brigades. As he rode back to his own headquarters, disgusted with the bickering he had just witnessed, Harvey Hill decided to take some actions of his own. He dispatched orders to Rodes instructing him not to wait for Huger's troops before marching north to rejoin the division. The Alabamian responded by starting his men north as soon as he had received the message, but the rain had turned White Oak Swamp into a dangerous obstacle. "The men had to wade in water waist-deep and a large number were completely submerged," Hill said later, "it was absolutely necessary to proceed with great caution to prevent the loss of both ammunition and life," By 1:00 p.m. only the leading skirmishers of the brigade had reached the Williamsburg Road.

Longstreet had not exempted Hill from the requirement to delay his attack until Huger reached his assigned position. But when the first of Rodes's mud covered soldiers staggered out of the woods, there was still no word of Huger. Hill's patience-at best fairly thin broke. He deployed his division into a two-brigade front. Samuel Garland's men were supported by those of George B. Anderson on the north side of the Williamsburg road. South of the pike, Rodes had been designated to lead the attack and Gabriel Rains to follow up. Rodes's front line consisted only of his weary skirmishers. Hill so badly wanted the Alabamian to command the right that he expected him to align each of his regiments as they exited the swamp and send them into battle one after another. Just after 1:00 p.m., and without orders, D. H. Hill fired his two signal guns over the Federal camps at Seven Pines, opening the battle seven hours later than Johnston had intended.

To greet them as they left the swamp was an abatis which was formed on the eastern fringe of a band of forest about 400 yards thick and what maps of the battle often depict as an open field, 400-500 yards wide. But even though the field had been cultivated at one time, it had apparently lain fallow for several years, and was now covered with a dense undergrowth, with here and there a break, where no growth was perceptible. Clusters of scrubby oaks or dwarf pines were scattered over the field." The combination of fog and stunted foliage partially blocked the Federal pickets' view of the forest across the field, which sheltered D. H. Hill's rebels.

But for the moment, Hill's division was in little better condition-at least as far as command organization went. Garland's brigade had lost very few men in the woods, but its command organization had nearly disintegrated in the dense undergrowth. Colonel Duncan McRae of the 5th North Carolina had been tasked to control the brigade's right flank, keeping it fixed on the Williamsburg Road. McRae, however, had not completely recovered from a wound suffered in the battle of Williamsburg, and exhaustion forced him off the field about the time the Confederates closed on the abatis. General Garland, hearing of this, rode toward that flank, intending to superintend that part of the line personally. While the brigade commander was so engaged, several companies of the 23rd North Carolina mistook shouted commands from officers of the 38th Virginia for those of their own colonel, and began to retreat. At approximately the same time, Major Richard L. Maury of the 24th Virginia the regiment's only field officer in the battle-was struck by a stray bullet, leaving Garland's largest regiment in momentary disarray. To make matters worse, small groups of men from the 2nd Mississippi Battalion had become interspersed among all the other formations, and their attempts to find their own fellows added to the chaos.

This was when Garland began to wonder where his supports were. He had already noticed (though he would not discover the reason for several days) that Rodes's "line of skirmishers upon our right, in the opposite side of the road, did not advance so rapidly as our own. - -." Nor could he spot Colonel George B. Anderson's Brigade, which was supposed to have followed him into the woods. Casting about for a staff officer to dash back and hurry Anderson along, Garland discovered that his entire staff was occupied in reorganizing the lines. With no one to send, "I trusted to Colonel Anderson's intuition as an accomplished soldier to perceive that we were hotly engaged," Garland wrote."

Anderson did not disappoint him. He brought the 1,865 men of his own four regiments, and his brigade had been reinforced by the Palmetto (South Carolina) Sharpshooters and the 6th South Carolina of Richard Anderson's Brigade, both under the command of Colonel Micah Jenkins. But this augmentation of strength also contributed to further confusion; Anderson's men had the same troubles with limited visibility and boggy ground that had plagued Garland. Lieutenant Colonel Charles T. Zachary reported that his 28th Georgia became so disoriented that it ended up on the right flank of the 49th Virginia, even though it had begun the approach march on that regiment's left. The Confederate attack north of the Williamsburg Road, which had swept the woods clear of Federals in about fifteen minutes, paused for at least that long to sort itself out.

The hesitation actually proved advantageous for the Southerners, because it allowed time for Rodes's attack south of the road to develop. True to his aggressive nature, D. H. Hill had ordered the signal guns fired before the bulk of Rodes's Brigade had waded out of White Oak Swamp. When Garland moved forward, only Colonel John B. Gordon's 6^th Alabama and Colonel William H. Taylor's 12^th Mississippi were in position to attack. Rodes had warned Hill that he could not possibly have the rest of his brigade in place for at least another fifteen minutes, maybe even thirty.

Hill ordered the attack despite Rodes's cautions. As he heard the first cracks of musketry north of the road, the thirty-three-year-old Virginian made the sort of split-second decision that later characterized him as one of the premiere small-unit tacticians in the Army of Northern Virginia. He sent the 6^th Alabama ahead as skirmishers, followed by the 12^th Mississippi, 150 yards behind. He planned his movement to contact as an advance of parallel lines, with each successive unit that exited the swamp falling into line behind the Mississippians, When the brigade neared the Federal lines, Rodes would order a redeployment into a brigade front with five regiments abreast, executing the maneuver in what he believed would be the full view of the enemy.

Rodes's plan was a potentially calamitous balancing act, which weighed the necessity to get rapidly into action on Garland's flank against the chances of murderous casualties from Union fire if the Federals held the woods in force. Thanks to Garland, they did not. The two companies of the 103rd Pennsylvania left south of the road by Major Gazzam had already fallen back before.

Colonel John B. Gordon's Alabamians (6^th Alabama) entered the woods. Without pausing for reflection orders, Gordon pushed his men through to the abatis. Kicking his horse in a leap over the first branches of the obstacle, Gordon shouted for the regiment to follow. Despite cries of "Shoot that man on horseback" from Casey's line followed by a hail of shot, no balls found Gordon, who remained fully visible while directing his companies through the abatis.

By sheer accident of timing, the 6^th Alabama burst from the woods out of the Williamsburg Road at the very moment Garland and Anderson resume the offensive north of the pike. Their combined brigades of more than 5,000 men formed a line so long that Casey immediately perceived it would overlay the right flank of his intermediate defense within minutes. It was obviously time to fall back on his rifle pits and redoubt, where he hoped to hold until Keyes sent up reinforcements.

D. H. Hill's frontal assault on the rifle pits would be spearheaded south of the Williamsburg Road by Rodes's Brigade and north of it again by those of Garland and G. B. Anderson. It was now 3:00 p.m. None of these brigades were fresh, having taken significant if not heavy casualties in the fighting for the woods and the abatis. But they were all flushed with victory, and intention continuing to drive the enemy. More importantly, for this attack Hill managed to get Captain Thomas H. Carter to muscle forward the five guns of his King William (Virginia) Artillery in direct support.

Confederate tactics here proved superior. While Bailey and his New Yorkers leveled their guns at the approaching lines of gray infantry, Carter had his Virginians target the Federal artillery. Bailey could and did inflict casualties, but as General Rodes noted: "their battery ... was in a moment after silenced and the occupants of the redoubt driven out. . . ." Bailey realized quickly that his error in targeting had made his position untenable; he ordered a withdrawal. Too many horses had been struck down by Carter's fire, however, leaving the twelve-pounders immobile. As the Confederate infantry advanced, the major ordered the cannon spiked, moving forward to take a hand in the operations himself, when he was killed by "a rifle ball passing through his brain. . . ." Making matters only worse, as the redoubt went silent, the 8th New York behind it unwisely opened fire. One of its first shells burst prematurely over the heads of the 85th New York, killing and wounding a number of soldiers, seriously shaking the morale of the regiment at the very center of the line.

For the troops in the rifle pits, the Confederate advance took on an aura of inevitability. "We had a full and near view of the enemy," recalled a private in the 85th Pennsylvania, "and could almost see the whites of their eyes." There was no lack of targets: "They presented a most formidable appearance, being eight or ten deep.... We could take dead aim, and firing in so dense a mass, to miss was almost impossible." Through the smoke, the Pennsylvanians strained to see if their shots had any effect: "At every discharge numbers were seen to fall, and a constant stream of wounded, dying and dead was being borne rearward. Yet on they came, as resistless [sic] as an avalanche."

Yet contrary to the feelings of the discouraged Federals, their fire was taking a heavy toll. "Our line moved to within fifty or sixty yards of the enemy's works," said the adjutant of the 4th North Carolina. "The men were falling rapidly," and the regiment paused behind the scant protection of a rail fence, waiting for Rodes' Brigade to catch up on their right. "The enemy's fire continued with unabated fury, and it was evident that the regiment could not remain here without being utterly destroyed......... Suddenly the Lieutenant spied the regiment's lone remaining field officer, Major Bryan Grimes, "sitting calmly on his iron-gray horse, with one leg thrown over the saddle bow . . . .

Grimes was probably wondering just what to do next. He would later gain quite a reputation as a tactician, rising to become the last major general appointed in the Army of Northern Virginia in 1865. But Seven Pines was his first real attack, and Grimes, a lawyer rather than a soldier by training, was hardly a seasoned officer. Sitting calmly on his horse may well have been as much as he could think of to do, until the adjutant seized his leg and shouted over the din, "Major, we can't stand this. Let us charge the works." "All right," Grimes replied, struck by the idea, "Charge them! Charge them!

The Federals actually broke before the Confederates arrived. To the right of the redoubt, in front of Grimes' men, the 85th Pennsylvania fell back when the men saw the gunners spiking their pieces." The 85th New York, on the opposite side of the fort, had already been shaken by friendly fire; beside them the colonel of the 92nd New York fell wounded from his horse in full view of his troops. Having a good view of the field, General Palmer realized that Rodes's advance would surely overrun his position. He could already hear firing to his left and rear.

Yet the immediate aftermath of this part of the battle was perhaps more significant for the survival of the Federal forces south of the Chickahominy river than the fight itself had been. Hill's division was, for the moment at least, spent. The 4th North Carolina had become so jaded that it captured the Yankee cannon in the redoubt, became spooked by noises in the smoke, retreated, and only returned several minutes later to reestablish its claim on the deserted guns. Rodes's Brigade, easily one of the most aggressively led units in the army, failed to follow the retreating Federals past the trenches, preferring instead to occupy them and wait for Carter to bring his battery forward for some more pounding. Rodes managed to convince himself that Casey's routed division was threatening to counterattack his position. Only D. H. Hill's arrival with one of Carter's cannon served to dispel this apprehension.

There was some substance to Rodes's fear of a counterattack, but it was slim, Joshua B. Howell Colonel of the 85th Pennsylvania as he fell back had successfully rallied a large portion of the regiment, somewhere in the second abatis behind the brigade camps. He even picked up bits and pieces of other units, "forming quite a battalion," which he promptly marched back toward the front. What was he doing, this one officer with a few hundred men in a makeshift formation, counterattacking an entire division? It is easy to suggest that his actions had nothing really to do with the battle itself, being more in the nature of one man's angry refusal to give way before the whirlwind. It was not much of an attack. Howell's men marched not quite back to their own camps, engaged the slowly advancing skirmishers of Rodes's Brigade, and were ordered back to the corps's second line by some saner staff officer wandering through the confusion. That was all of it.

But not quite. On the battlefield perceptions are often equally as important as realities. Rodes and Hill perceived in Howell's gesture some last inkling of fight in Casey's division. It was just enough to make them pause for a few minutes and count their own casualties before they resumed the battle, before they tried to maul a second Federal division in a single afternoon.

To the point at which Hill's division drove Casey's out of the rifle pits west of Seven Pines, the battle had been primarily that of two divisions slugging it out in the marshy wilderness, almost completely isolated from any larger design of the corps or army commanders.

How many unwounded men remained in Rodes's and Rains's Brigades to throw against the Federal line? The question can only be answered with rough estimates. Rodes had entered the fight with 2,200 men, Rains with about 2,870. The context of Rodes's report, as well as those of his regimental commanders, suggests that the majority of his 1,099 casualties were suffered in the last attack of the day. D. H. Hill noted that it cost Rodes at least 500 men, which means that the brigade probably carried no more than 1,600 soldiers into the final fight of the day. Rains reported much lighter casualties after the battle-roughly 410-most of which were suffered as the brigade turned the flank in the battle for the rifle pits. He therefore led at least 2,400 men in to the final attack. Having started out with nearly 9,000 men in his division, D. H. Hill could only commit 4,000 to the last desperate attempt to shatter IV Corps completely and all of those would be south of the Williamsburg Road.

Across the lines D. H. Hill counted the costs and prepared to bury the dead. He did not worry that much about the next day, for Longstreet's division had finally passed through his and taken over responsibility for the front line. "The tents and commissariat of the Yankee general Casey were found to be in excellent condition, and we all fared well that night," he reported.

By now it was almost completely dark. General Johnston had ridden back from his unsuccessful attempt to find Longstreet. The few staff officers and couriers attending him were quite nervous. The center of Whiting's division was in obvious disarray, Union soldiers threatened to appear out of the night at any moment, and bullets still ricocheted through the evening. They thought it an area decidedly unsafe for the army commander.

Johnston, blissfully unaware of his own decisive mistakes, seemed to have regained some measure of personal equanimity. If he had not won a decisive baffle, he certainly had not lost one either, and the dawn might well reveal that Longstreet's success had been enough to justify the continuation of the attack. "So I announced to my staff officers that each regiment must sleep where it might be standing when the contest ceased for the night, to be ready to renew it at dawn the next morning." Then the first bullet hit him.

Random shots flying through the darkness had unnerved his staff officers for more than an hour, yet General Johnston seemed unaffected. He might equivocate over the commitment of a reserve division, but the physical risks of battle did not daunt him. He even tried to calm a young colonel on his staff who jerked his head back and forth, as if to avoid stinging bees. "Colonel, there is no use dodging," Johnston said quietly, "when you hear them they have passed." Seconds later, a musket ball struck him in the shoulder. The ball was nearly spent, the wound was not serious. Alone, it would not even have required Johnston to dismount. Following it by moments, however, one of the last shells fired from Kirby's battery burst, fragments entering the general's chest and thigh, throwing him to the ground. Courier Drury Armistead scooped his commander into his arms almost before anyone could tell if Johnston was alive or dead, and carried him back several hundred yards to relative safety.

So ended the first day of the Battle for Seven Pines, Johnston wounded and a command structure infighting to be his successor and no orders for a plan of attack for the coming day.

As aggressive as Harvey Hill was, even he did not contemplate a major attack on June 1. His own division had suffered at least 3,000 casualties in the fight for Seven Pines. When Longstreet told him that "no help could be expected" from Smith or the rest of the army, the North Carolinian "resolved to concentrate my troops around the captured works in the hope that the Yankees would attempt to retake them." But, reinforced with five fresh brigades, Hill could not find it within himself to remain completely on the defensive.

Learning that Federal skirmishers had appeared in front of Pickett's brigade, Hill resolved to beat the Federals to the punch by initiating a short, sharp attack. "He ordered me to attack," George Pickett reported, "and I supposed the same order was given to other brigade commanders." In this the inexperienced Pickett misunderstood Hill, who had not intended a general advance. Only the brigades of Lewis Armistead and William Mahone, on Pickett's left, had been ordered to support him; those of Pryor and Wilcox, on his right, remained on the defensive. Here was the irony of the second day of battle Seven Pines. While Gustavus Smith awaited a massive, coordinated assault by no fewer than eight brigades under Longstreet, the Georgian was not even near the front line. The only attack prepared was at the initiative of Hill. A junior division commander, using a force of just three brigades from two different divisions, neither of which was his own.

There would be more skirmishing and sharpshooting throughout the rest of the day, but the second day of the battle of Seven Pines was effectively over by mid-morning. One Federal officer, disgusted with the claims and counterclaims of grand plans and sweeping attacks made after the war, summed up the results of combat on June 1 accurately and succinctly:

The truth is that this was a small, short, sharp infantry fight, between a little more than five brigades of Federals and about five brigades of Confederates. The musketry was intense while it lasted. There were few changes of position. The rebels yelled tremendously. We certainly re-enforced our original front line, and the Confederates undoubtedly re-enforced theirs. It was a hot, cloudless, long, trying afternoon.

At 1:30 p.m., Jefferson Davis returned to army headquarters. He asked where General Lee could be found. Surprised, Smith said he had not seen Lee all day, and "asked if he had any special reason for supposing General Lee would be there at that time." The president responded that he had instructed Lee early that morning to assume Johnston's old command. "Ah!" said Smith, feigning a joviality he could not have felt, "in that case he will probably soon be here... Awkwardly, the two men waited together for one-half hour; they "chatted upon a variety of commonplace subjects," the Kentuckian recalled, "but made no allusion to anything pertaining to the state of affairs on the field." At 2:00 p.m. General Robert E. Lee, riding Traveller, appeared and assumed command of the Army of Northern Virginia.

In the drizzling mist of a sodden dawn on June 4,1862, the soldiers of the 11th Massachusetts woke upon the late battlefield of Seven Pines. Forming a part of the first brigade of Hooker's division, the Massachusetts men had not been engaged in either day of the battle, but on the night of June 3 constituted the advance guard when the III Corps cautiously returned in the wake of the Confederate withdrawal forty-eight hours earlier. As first light penetrated the trees, horrified infantrymen discovered that they had spent the night in a charnel house. "Scores of horses, and the swollen and black corpses of hundreds of rebels, were stretched upon the ground," remembered Captain H. N. Blake. Some of the soldiers discovered belatedly that the wood they had scavenged for fires came from "the rude headboards which the rebels had placed over the graves of those they had buried." Others awoke to find that the offending arm or foot which had made sleep difficult had not been that of a comrade but that of a corpse."

The worst of it all was the maggots. Left untended and unburied for several days, the bodies of Rebel and Yank alike had become a feast for the chalky white parasites. "Myriad's of maggots were feasting upon the putrid forms," wrote Captain Blake, "and swarmed upon the earth, so that it was difficult to walk without crushing them beneath the feet." As they slept on the damp ground, the haversacks, bedrolls, and clothes of the 11th Massachusetts had been invaded by the "loathsome [sic] worms." Not surprisingly, most of the men skipped breakfast.

There was no shortage of food for the worms. According to the official reports and the statistical calculations of Thomas Livermore, just over 5,000 Union soldiers became casualties at the battle of Seven Pines; the losses for the Confederates totaled more than 6,000. Compared to Manassas, this was the bloodiest fight yet seen in the East; measured by the standard established at Shiloh, however, Seven Pines is usually relegated to the position of prologue to the greater battles yet to be fought around Richmond. But in terms of controversies, reputations ruined, and long-cherished misconceptions, this battle falls into rank alongside Gettysburg and Chattanooga.

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Last Updated: Monday, May 11, 2009