Page:Southern Historical Society Papers volume 34.djvu/27

 General Lee's Strategy at Chancellor sville. 19

orable for him. We were unable last evening to dislodge him. I am now swinging around to my left to come up in his rear. "1" learn, from prisoners taken, that Heintzelman's troops from Washington are here, and the enemy seems to have con- centrated his strength for this effort. If I had with me all my command, and could keep it supplied with provisions and forage, I should feel easy, but, as far as I can judge, the advantage of numbers and position is greatly in favor of the enemy."

This letter, which is in the Official Records, precludes the idea of a letter the night of May ist, such as Colonel Marshall says was dictated by General Lee to Mr. Davis, "giving him fully the situation," unless General Lee had forgotten what he wrote the night before.

It is evident that Dr. Dabney corrected his manuscript with General Lee's letter to Mrs. Jackson before him, for he omitted the statement that General Lee proposed to attack General Hook- er's position at Chancellorsville in front, and' adopted almost the exact language of General Lee in stating what it was decided to do, but he used the word "proposed," which was not General Lee's, probably through inadvertence, or on the supposition that it expressed General Lee's true meaning as well or better than "undertook."

What General Lee did say was, that General Jackson "un- dertook to throw his command entirely in Hooker's rear," but Dr. Dabney says that General Jackson "proposed to throw his command entirely into Hooker's rear," and further contro- versy on the question is practically narrowed down to the mean- ing of the word "undertook/' as used by General Lee in his letter to Mrs. Jackson.

What General Lee wrote to Mrs. Jackson should be taken in connection with his official report and his letter to Dr. Bled- soe, thus :

"In the operations around Chancellorsville I overtook Gen- eral Jackson, who had been placed in command of the advance as the skirmishers of the approaching armies met, advanced with the troops to the Federal line of defenses, and was on the field until their whole army recrossed the Rappahannock. There is