Page:Southern Historical Society Papers volume 27.djvu/243

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while Suiniicr led 31,000 into Fredericksburg by the upper pontoon bridj

As the fog lifted on the I2th of December and Lee looked out from the high hill in the centre of his position chosen by him for his headquarters, and saw this great host stretched for miles to his front and to his right in "brave battle array," he knew that the Federal commander had chosen the perilous plan of a direct attack. Lee had already made preparations to meet such an assault, and he promptly directed Jackson to concentrate his men on the right of the army and take command of the right wing. Our own gallant and beloved fellow-citizen; that brave soldier and patriot whom we all know and admire; that saintly man of God whom we see among us every day, the Rev. James P. Smith, D. D., of Jackson's staff, late in the evening rode eighteen miles to D. H. Hill's headquarters down the river. That able commander, by marching eighteen miles over the same rugged road that night, placed his men in position on Jackson's right by the dawn of the i3th; and, by doing this, Lee was ready to receive the assault before Burnside was ready to commence it.

THE CONFEDERATES CONCEALED.

Not informed as to the movements of Jackson's men, and suppos- ing from the information he had gathered from the balloons sent up, that the greater portion of Lee's army was down the Rappahannock, Burnside attempted to turn Lee's right and secure the highway to Richmond and defeat him by a flank and rear attack. But a large forest concealed the Confederate right, and the Federal commander was greatly surprised, when he began the execution of his flanking movement with Franklin's Corps, to find Jackson in position at Hamilton's Crossing, and that A. P. Hill's 10,000 veterans were drawn up in double line, with fourteen pieces of field artillery on his right and thirty-three on his left; while Early's and Taliaferro's divisions were in order of battle in A. P. Hill's rear and D. H. Hill's division was in reserve. Stuart's cavalry were in advance of Jack- son's right and played havoc on the Federal lines as they advanced.

Marye's Heights were crowded with batteries, while under them, in front, there was a thick fence. Franklin was ordered to begin the attack on the Confederate right. Under cover of a dense fog, he deployed 55,000 men on the plain in front of Jackson, and when the fog lifted, that chill December day, the Federal lines, infantry and artillery, were revealed " in battle's magnificently stern array." In