Page:Confederate Military History - 1899 - Volume 4.djvu/344

318 took part in the campaigns of Second Manassas and Sharpsburg. On the return of Colonel Avery to his regiment, Colonel Hoke was assigned to the command of the Twenty-first regiment of Trimble s brigade, Early’s division. This brigade he commanded in the battle of Fredericksburg, and won the unstinted praises of Early and Jackson by the prompt and vigorous manner in which he drove back Meade s troops after they had broken the Confederate right. He pursued the enemy, capturing 300 prisoners, until he found himself exposed to a flank attack, when he retired in good order, leaving part of his command to hold the railroad cut from which the Federals had been ousted. In January following he was promoted brigadier-general and assigned to the command of Trimble’s brigade, including the Sixth, Twenty-first, Fifty-fourth, Fifty-seventh North Carolina regiments and the First battalion. During the battle of Chancellorsville he fought at Fredericksburg, where he was wounded May 4th, so seriously as to prevent his participation in the Pennsylvania and Rappahannock campaigns. In January, 1864, he reported to General Pickett at Petersburg, where his brigade was sent, and for warded to North Carolina. In the latter part of the month he organized the movement against New Bern from Kinston. At the head of one column he successfully surprised and captured the enemy’s outposts, and defeated the troops which were thrown against him, but on account of the delay of the other column, was unable to reduce the post. On April 17th, in command of the Confederate forces, he attacked the Federal forts at Plymouth, and vigorously pushed the assaults, aided by the ram Albemarle against the enemy’s gunboats, until the garrison of 3,000 men was surrendered April 20th. For this brilliant achievement, which was of great value in moral effect at this critical period in the war, Congress voted him a resolution of thanks, and he was promoted major-general, the commission bearing the date of his vic-