Rhodes saw Jackson, and reported to him the condition of his command; he stated that he did not know how far his flanks extended, and suggested that he should withdraw to re-form, and that Hill should come up and take his place. Jackson consented reluctantly, as he wished to push on farther to Hooker's right, and cut him off from the United States Ford.

While Hill was filing into position, Jackson, ambitious, restless, and eager, with several of his staff and couriers, rode to the front, now in the woods to the right of the road, to discover the Federal position. It was found only two hundred or three hundred yards distant. Upon returning, Hill's men, who had taken position to the right of the road, hearing the sound, as they supposed, of advancing Federal cavalry, fired several volleys. Jackson was wounded in his right arm. Two officers of the Signal Corps, accompanying him, were killed, and others of his escort wounded. Jackson then attempted to cross the road, and before he again penetrated many feet into the woods, the infantry line, resting its right on the road, fired a volley. Two shots took effect in the left arm of Jackson; the reins dropped from his useless hands; his horse rushed through the woods, the limbs of the trees scratching his face and bending him backward. The only remaining unwounded officer of the staff hastened. to him, and caught him just as he was about to fall. A rough, square stone, with no inscription on it, but marked by relic-hunters, stands to-day by the side of the lonely road in the dense woods to mark this spot. During this time, the firing of the artillery was terrific, and raked the road and woods.

General Hill, next in command, quickly came up, and was leaning over Jackson to hear his orders, when he too was shot, and the command devolved upon Rhodes, who, in turn, feeling a distrust of himself, transferred the command to General Stuart, the cavalry chief.

During this time, the Federal skirmishers were advan

cing, and two were captured by an officer of Hill's staff within a few feet of where Jackson lay. Jackson had fallen in front of his own line, and, fearing a farther advance of the Federals, a stretcher was hastily procured and the General placed upon it. The escort had proceeded but a short distance when the bearer on the right of Captain Smith was shot down; another quickly stepped in his place and prevented the body from falling. In another moment he too was killed, and the body fell from the stretcher four or five feet to the ground, the General giving utterance to exclamations of pain. The firing continued with such violence that all lay down and hugged the earth, until a cessation enabled them to bear the General to an ambulance, when he was removed to the Rev. Dr. Lacey's house, two or three miles distant, where his arm was amputated. In a week he died from pneumonia. Thus breathed his last this great soldier and misguided man! He was Lee's best lieutenant, and his death was deeply mourned throughout the Confederate army and the South. It will be noticed that after Jackson's death, Lee never attempted another flank

movement.

The vacillation exhibited by Hooker from the time he reached Chancellorsville was increased by the rout of the Eleventh Corps. The dash, resolution, confidence, and promptness which had hitherto characterized him when a division and a corps commander were lost; he seemed to be almost helpless, and unequal to the emergency. At nine o'clock in the evening, he sent word to Sedgwick to take up his line on the Chancellorsville road and attack and destroy any forces he met with. He also added that he, Sedgwick, would probably fall upon the rear of Lee's forces, and that between them they would use Lee up.

Sedgwick received this order about eleven o'clock that night, and at once advanced his command on the Bowling Green road, and then marched by the flank toward

Fredericksburg. The progress was necessarily slow; the night was dark, and although the order was frequently given to brush away the enemy's pickets, the head of the column was delayed at Hazel Run by a sharp skirmish, as well as at other places along the route. It was just at break of day that the advance reached the rear of Fredericksburg. A negro who came into the lines reported the heights occupied, and that the enemy were cutting the canal to flood the roads. In our front were Marye's Heights, the scene of the attack of Summer and Couch. under Burnside. Several regiments were at once thrown. to the front, and this movement discovered the enemy in force.

The town was perfectly quiet; not a person was to be seen on the streets, and the windows and blinds were closed. It had the appearance of a deserted village. The marks of the fierce cannonade to which the town had been exposed in the previous December were everywhere visible. By this time Warren, having left Hooker's headquarters at 10.30 the previous evening, and ridden all night, arrived. Before he left Hooker, it had been determined to leave a sufficient force in front of the right wing of the enemy to hold our breastworks, and the whole of the rest of our forces was to be thrown upon his left, under Stuart, at dawn of day. But Hooker again changed his opinion, and ordered Sickles, who was well to the front, and whose right was exposed by the break of the Eleventh Corps, to fall back.

Stuart had, however, determined to attack. He wished to connect his right with Lee's left, then several miles. distant; and as soon as the morning fog lifted, fighting commenced. The battle raged with great fury for several hours, the enemy steadily pushing back Sickles and a part of Slocum, until a new line was taken up by the whole army, north of the Chancellor House, from one to two miles in rear of the original position. Stuart and Lee were again united, and now felt irresistible.

During this attack, Hooker was injured by the fall of a portion of the column supporting the veranda of the Chancellor House, which had been struck by a solid ball. The command of the army then fell upon Couch, who was unwilling to assume the responsibility, and who, as he says, simply acted as an executive officer to General Hooker in fulfilling his instructions, which were to draw in the front and make some new dispositions.

Sickles was also wounded; and the gallant Berry, who had done so much to stay the attack of Jackson the night before, fell in the thickest of the fight. Crosby, of Battery F, of the Fourth United States Artillery, was killed about nine o'clock A. M. by a musket-ball, while firing his guns. Best, chief of artillery of the Twelfth Corps, wrote of him on May 10th: "My pen almost refuses to record his untimely death; young, ambitious, highly educated, efficient as an artillery officer, unexceptionable in his habits, a Christian, practising as he believed. The service lost an officer of great value, and it seems yet a dream that his gallant heart is hushed forever."

During the morning, the most earnest appeals were made by Sickles and Slocum to Hooker for ammunition. and reinforcements, but they were in vain. Hooker is said to have replied that he could not make soldiers or ammunition; and yet the Fifth, First, and a portion of the Second Corps, comprising nearly forty thousand men, were but a short distance off, and had scarcely fired a shot. Hancock behaved magnificently, as he always did, and by his vigorous stand around the Chancellor House, fighting in three different directions at the same time, enabled Sickles to withdraw, not, however, without considerable loss.

The following telegrams from Rufus Ingalls to Butterfield, written upon the field, give some idea of the desperate character of the fighting, and of the excitement that prevailed at headquarters. The first telegram is dated May 3, 8.45 A. M. "The most terrible conflict has raged

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since daylight. Enemy in great force in our front and on the right, but at this moment we are repulsing him on all sides. Carnage is fearful. Our trains are all safe, and we shall be victorious."

The second is the same date, at 12.45 P. M. "I think we have had the most terrible battle ever witnessed on earth. I think our victory will be certain; but the General told me he would say nothing to Washington, except that he was doing well. In an hour or two the matter will be a fixed fact. I believe the enemy is in flight now, but we are not sure."

The third was on the same day, at 8.45 evening: “We can say nothing at present about forage and subsistence; if we succeed, we shall at once march to Fredericksburg. If we fail, we must try soon to reach our depots. The question must soon resolve itself."

On May 4th, at 12 M., Ingalls telegraphed to Captain Rankin, remaining at the old headquarters of the army: "Do not come up here yourself; perhaps no one had better come just yet. Keep quiet. Do not make any excitement. We are in great trouble, but we shall fight it out. Do not communicate with Washington on the subject."

As soon as it was practicable, and as secretly as possible, Sedgwick - in compliance with the orders received during the night, to advance toward Chancellorsville prepared to attack the Heights. Gibbon, who had been left on the north bank of the river, crossed shortly after Sedgwick had captured the town, and moved to the right; but his advance was stopped by the canal in his front, over which it was impossible to lay bridges, in face of the fire from the artillery and infantry lining the hill.

Sedgwick's attack was made in two columns formed upon the Plank and Telegraph Roads, supported by a line of infantry upon the left of the Plank Road. As the columns moved out of the town, the batteries on the hill at once opened, and the troops suffered considerably. As they steadily pressed on, the fire became more destructive,