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Lot 45
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Battle of Chancellorsville Map, Former Foes Work Together to Clarify the History
Battle of Chancellorsville Map, Former Foes Work Together to Clarify the History
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Description:

Civil War

 

Battle of Chancellorsville Map, Former Foes Work Together to Clarify the History

 

“You see I had a right to think I was flanked when I asked Heth for McGowan to prolong my right. Didn’t Sickles attack in columns instead of a continuous or connected line? We thought so that night.”

 

This fascinating map drawn by Union Army surgeon and corps historian and annotated by a Confederate brigadier general graphically illustrates the confusion on the night of May 2, 1863, at the Battle of Chancellorsville in the aftermath of General Stonewall Jackson’s flank attack on the Army of the Potomac. Augustus C. Hamlin drew and labeled this map and sent it to James H. Lane, then a professor in Alabama, for his comments and corrections. Lane responded by adding his own annotations to the map, referring in both third person and first person to himself. He also wrote to Hamlin, “My brigade was in nearly every great battle fought by the Army of Northern Virginia, but in none did I ever witness so many harrowing scenes as I did at Chancellorsville. Also included is a softcover version of "The Battle of Chancellorsville / Jackson's Attack" by Augustus Choate Hamlin, published 1896.

 

In his quest to get the facts related to the assault on the Union Eleventh Corps by Jackson’s Second Corps, Hamlin consulted with both Union and Confederate officers and soldiers, visited the battlefield three times, and sketched and revised maps many times. In the preface to his published 1896 account, Hamlin wrote, “All accessible maps, official and unofficial, relating to the territory, have been consulted, and with their aid, strengthened with new surveys, a series of new maps has been constructed, showing the position of the various bodies of troops at brief intervals of time, to demonstrate the correctness of the narrative.”

 

[CIVIL WAR.] AUGUSTUS C. HAMLIN and JAMES H. LANE, Autograph Document, Hand-drawn and annotated map, dated last half of 19th century, possibly near contemporary to the Battle, but no later than 1892. 1 p., 6.25" x 7.875". Thin paper, some discoloration on edges; very good.

 

Excerpts of Annotation by Lane

“How Lane bent back after he repulsed Sickles & was prolonged by McGowan. You see I had a right to think I was flanked when I asked Heth for McGowan to prolong my right. Didn’t Sickles attack in columns instead of a continuous or connected line? We thought so that night.”

 

“About the point to which Lane rode after he was repulsed Sunday morning & where he made that exclamation or remark—No enemy there then.”       

 

“Right half of 33rd [North Carolina] left as first formed. Additional skirmishers thrown out on right from other regiments.”                                                     

 

Historical Background

For decades after the Battle of Chancellorsville, the Eleventh Corps of the Army of the Potomac bore the brunt of the blame for the Union Army’s failure to trap and destroy Confederate General Robert E. Lee’s much smaller Army of Northern Virginia. Composed largely of New York, Pennsylvania, and Ohio regiments with a large number of German and other Central European immigrants, the Eleventh Corps was led by Major General Oliver O. Howard, who had recently replaced Franz Sigel. Nearly a third of the corps had never seen combat. It secured the right flank of the Army of the Potomac on May 1, 1863, a few miles west of Chancellorsville.

 

In a bold gamble, Lee divided his army in the face of a superior force and sent General Thomas J. “Stonewall” Jackson’s Second Corps with 28,000 men marching west behind the main Confederate force to attack the Union Army’s right flank from the west. Although the overall Union commander of the Army of the Potomac Joseph Hooker instructed Howard to defend against an attack from the west, Howard failed to do so. Neither Hooker nor Howard believed the Confederates could attack through the dense woods to the west.

 

Jackson’s forces attacked around 5:30 p.m. on May 2, and what happened next became the subject of decades of controversy. Some of the regiments, including the 75th Ohio and Major General Carl Schurz’s division, quickly reoriented to face the attack and resisted for twenty minutes before the overwhelming strength of the Confederate assault forced them to retreat. The corps lost about one quarter of its men, including 12 of 23 regimental commanders, indicating that it had resisted the Confederate attack.

 

The rout might have been worse, but Confederate General Jackson rode forward to survey the possibility of a night attack under a full moon. As he and his staff officers returned to their lines, Confederates from the 18th North Carolina Infantry mistook them for Union cavalry and fired into the group. Jackson was wounded three times, and his left arm had to be amputated. While recovering, he developed pneumonia and died on May 10. His wounding effectively ended the Confederate attack.

 

The battle continued the next day, as the Army of Northern Virginia forced the Army of the Potomac to retreat toward the Rappahannock River. Union forces under General John Sedgwick drove Confederate defenders away from nearby Fredericksburg but failed to rejoin Hooker’s main force. By May 6, Hooker had withdrawn over the Rappahannock, and Lee savored his greatest victory, but with the loss of 22 percent of his army that he could not easily replace.

 

Assigning blame for the embarrassing Union defeat at Chancellorsville began almost immediately. President Lincoln was horrified, and exclaimed, “My God! My God! What will the country say?” For years, Hooker blamed Howard for his loss at Chancellorsville. Anti-German sentiment found a convenient scapegoat among the German and other European soldiers of the Eleventh Corps, and the story gained force from many retellings.

 

In the 1890s, Surgeon Augustus C. Hamlin of Maine, who was present at the Battle of Chancellorsville as the Medical Director of the Eleventh Corps, decided to set the record straight and defend the Eleventh Corps against what he considered unjust criticism. In 1893, he published a lengthy account of Jackson’s attack on May 2, 1863, in the weekly newspaper The National Tribune. Published in installments between June 22 and August 10, the account was an early version of his 1896 book The Battle of Chancellorsville: The Attack of Stonewall Jackson and His Army upon the Right Flank of the Army of the Potomac at Chancellorsville, Virginia, on Saturday Afternoon, May 2, 1863.

 

 

Augustus Choate Hamlin (1829-1905) was born in Maine and graduated from Bowdoin College in 1851 and from the Harvard Medical School in 1855. After spending a year in Europe, he established a medical practice in Bangor, Maine. Hamlin served in the Union Army during the entire civil war, first as an assistant surgeon with the 2nd Maine Infantry, then as a brigade surgeon from April 1862, and as a medical inspector from February 1863. He was haunted by reports that he fled from the 2nd Maine Infantry when it came under fire at the First Battle of Bull Run in the summer of 1861 and spent decades denying it. He served as medical director under General Franz Sigel in northern Virginia. Hamlin was the nephew of Vice President Hannibal Hamlin. After the war, he resumed his medical practice in Bangor and twice served as mayor. In 1866, he wrote and illustrated Martyria; or Andersonville Prison about the notorious Confederate prison in Georgia. From 1882 to 1886, he was the Surgeon-General of Maine. In 1896, he published The Battle of Chancellorsville: The Attack of Stonewall Jackson and His Army upon the Right Flank of the Army of the Potomac at Chancellorsville, Virginia, on Saturday Afternoon, May 2, 1863, a defense of Major General Oliver O. Howard’s Eleventh Corps. He was also an avid collector of the gemstone tourmaline and wrote several books about it.

James H. Lane (1833-1907) was born in Virginia, graduated from the Virginia Military Institute in 1854, and received a master’s degree from the University of Virginia in 1857. He served as a professor of mathematics at the Virginia Military Institute, then as a professor of natural philosophy at the North Carolina Military Institute until the start of the Civil War. He received a commission as a major in the 1st North Carolina Infantry in May 1861 and by September received promotion to the colonel of the 28th North Carolina Infantry. He assumed command of the brigade in General Thomas J. “Stonewall” Jackson’s Second Corps after Brigadier General Lawrence O. Branch was killed at the Battle of Antietam. Lane was promoted to brigadier general on November 1, 1862, and led his brigade of North Carolina regiments in the Battles of Chancellorsville and Gettysburg. Soldiers from his brigade accidentally shot General Jackson during the Battle of Chancellorsville. Wounded several times throughout the war, Lane continued to lead his brigade to the surrender at Appomattox Court House. After the war, Lane returned to academic life and served as a professor of civil engineering and commerce at Virginia Agricultural and Mechanical College (Virginia Tech University) from 1872 to 1881, and as professor of civil engineering at Alabama Polytechnic Institute (Auburn University) from 1881 until his death.

 

 

This item comes with a Certificate from John Reznikoff, a premier authenticator for both major 3rd party authentication services, PSA and JSA (James Spence Authentications), as well as numerous auction houses.

 

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