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Updated: May 4, 2025
This was the first engagement in a campaign destined to cost the lives of many brave men and to end in a terrible disaster to the national arms. After making a heroic stand and holding McClellan and his overwhelming force at bay for nearly a month, Magruder abandoned his lines and fell back to Williamsburgh on the road up the Peninsula to Richmond. He was slowly followed by McClellan's army.
All idea of this march of more than two hundred miles across a barren country, with no water in the summer and fall, while in the winter and spring there is plenty of water but no road, was now given up once for all. Besides the natural obstacles, there was Magruder to be reckoned with at the end of the march and Taylor in the rear.
The roar of the guns in Fort Magruder interrupted the conversation. The gunners of the battery in front of them had been driven from their pieces; but it was almost instantly manned by volunteers, and a destructive fire poured into the works. Other batteries were brought up, and the fort was soon silenced.
It must be borne in mind that, during the operations north of the Chickahominy, the divisions of Magruder and Huger had remained in position between McClellan's left and Richmond. We encountered troops of Magruder's, Huger's, and other divisions, seeking to find their proper routes. Countless questions about roads were asked in vain.
Late in the evening General Lee informed me that I would remain the following day to guard Bottom's and the railway bridges, while Stuart's cavalry watched the river below to Long Bridge and beyond. From all indications, he thought that McClellan would withdraw during the night, and expected to cross the river in the morning to unite with Magruder and Huger in pursuit.
General Magruder, the ex-commander-in-chief of the Confederate forces in Texas, having also become naturalized, was placed in charge of the survey of the lands set aside for colonization as chief of the Colonization Land Office.
He found Jackson and Magruder at the edge of the peach orchard. All around were Magruder's troops, and every man's head was turned toward the stark and dust-hued figure on the dust-hued nag. The first had come from the Valley with a towering reputation, nor indeed did the last lack bards to sing of him.
As he was now between seventy and eighty, and had been at the work for at least twenty years, most of those concerned had allowed themselves to think that he would ride his hobby harmlessly to the day of his parliamentary death. But the drop from a house corner will hollow a stone by its constancy, and Major Magruder at last persuaded the House to grant him a Committee of Inquiry.
Magruder, with his own and McLaws' Division, supported Smith, and was to act as emergencies required. Kershaw was now under McLaws. Huger was to march up on the Charles City Road and put in on Longstreet's left as it uncovered at White Oak Swamp, or to join his forces with Longstreet's and the two drive the enemy back from the railroad.
The woods had been felled for some distance in front of the earthworks and forts, and as we neared the former we could see the enemy's skirmishers pushing out of the woods in the clearing. The Second and Eighth South Carolina Regiments were ordered to occupy the forts and breastworks beyond Fort Magruder, and they had a perfect race to reach them before the enemy did.
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