Page:Confederate Military History - 1899 - Volume 12.djvu/242

228 the advanced position near Washington to the Rappahannock. On the 9th the Confederate army was entirely gone from its former position at Manassas, and on the next day McClellan moved toward the deserted intrenchments. A few days later his army changed direction and was massed near Alexandria. From this place it was transferred entire, except McDowell's corps, to Fortress Monroe, to begin the Peninsula campaign.

McClellan's plans were not satisfactory to the Washington management of the war, because it began to appear from the movements of Stonewall Jackson in the Valley that the city had been left without sufficient protection. Moved by this fear, McDowell, with 30,000 men, was temporarily retained on the Potomac, but McClellan's command still consisted of nearly 100,000 total, before which the Confederate force at Yorktown, after delaying the Federals awhile, retired, and Norfolk was necessarily abandoned.

The first of the series of battles between the two armies after Johnston had fallen back, was fought at Williamsburg on the 5th of May, and the next at Seven Pines or Fair Oaks. In this latter battle, of May 3ist and June 1st, the Confederates shattered the left wing of the Federal line, capturing 6, ooo muskets, ten guns and a large number of prisoners. General Johnston was severely wounded and Gen. Robert E. Lee was assigned to the command of the army. This victory of the Confederates under General Johnston refreshed the spirit of his army and the appointment of Lee at this critical moment increased the Southern confidence. McClellan was checked for the time by the defeat at Seven Pines, which proved to be the prelude of his many reverses.

The Confederate armies in the West, commanded by Beauregard and Albert Sidney Johnston, were struggling through April and May to sustain the Confederacy