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Updated: June 28, 2025
When Johnston marched to the Peninsula he had left a force of 8000 men, under General Ewell, on the Upper Rappahannock, and with this force Jackson had been instructed to co-operate. But with the road across the Massanuttons in his possession Banks could move into the Luray Valley, and occupying Swift Run Gap with a detachment, cut the communication between the two Confederate generals.
But the roads were still deep in mud, and his army was forced to toil on all that day and the next, while the signalmen on the top of the Massanuttons told every movement he made to Stonewall Jackson. The signals the second evening told Jackson that the two Northern armies were advancing fast, and that he would soon have before him an enemy outnumbering him anywhere from two to three to one.
It was the mighty mass of the Massanuttons that weighed upon Banks. As he looked up at the dark ridges and misty crests his mind was torn by doubts. His own forces, great in number though they were, were scattered. Fremont to his right on the slopes of the Alleghanies had 25,000 men; there were other strong detachments under Milroy and Schenck, and he had 17,000 men under his own eye.
The mountains and the valley between were bathed in light once more. The heavy dark green foliage on the slopes of the Massanuttons rested the eye and the green fields of the valley were cheering. "I don't believe I'd ever forget this valley if I lived to be a thousand," said Harry. "I've marched up and down it so much and every second of the time was so full of excitement."
To the north stood the Massanuttons, with their forests sleeping in the noon-day; and to the right of the Massanuttons, displaying, in that transparent atmosphere, every shade of that royal colour from which it takes its name, the Blue Ridge loomed large against the eastern sky.
On the further shore Ashby now kept guard between Fremont and the host in grey. As for Shields, he was on the far side of the Massanuttons, before him a bridgeless, swollen torrent and a guarded mountain pass. Before becoming dangerous he must move south and round the Massanuttons. Far from achieving junction, space had widened between Shields and Fremont.
Ewell's cavalry regiments, the 2nd and 6th Virginia, held the Luray Valley, with a detachment east of the Blue Ridge. May 20. On the 20th Jackson arrived at New Market, thirty miles from Mount Solon. Ewell had meanwhile marched to Luray, and the two wings were now on either side of the Massanuttons. On his way to New Market Jackson had been joined by the Louisiana brigade of Ewell's division.
The general could not see the place; it lay between the Massanuttons and the Blue Ridge, but it was in his mind. He spoke to an aide. "To-morrow I think I will recall Kenly and send him down the pike to develop the force of the enemy." The small town of Strasburg pulsed with flaring lights and with the manifold sounds of the encamped army.
The turnpike to Winchester crosses both forks in succession, at a point where they are divided by a stretch of meadows a mile in width. In addition to these two bridges, a wooden viaduct carried the railway over the South Fork, whence, passing between the North Fork and the Massanuttons, it runs south of the stream to Strasburg.
Jackson after a while reined his horse out of the road, and his staff, of course, followed. The troops filed past and Jackson said: "We will soon pass the Gap in the Massanuttons, and Shields cannot come out there ahead of us. That danger is left behind." "What of the junction between Shields and Fremont, General?" asked one of the older officers. Jackson cast one glance at the somber heavens.
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