Part of a series of articles titled If This Valley is Lost, Virginia is Lost.
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Battle of McDowell
Confederate Gen. Stonewall Jackson won his first victory of the 1862 Valley Campaign at McDowell. Jackson’s skillful maneuvers deceived the Federals into thinking he was leaving the Valley, before doubling back to take a strong position on Sitlington’s Hill.
McDowell Battlefield
Shenandoah Valley Battlefields Foundation (SVBF) preserves McDowell Battlefield Park. A 1.5-mile hike leads to the battleline on top of Sitlington’s Hill. Visit McDowell Battlefield »
Jackson in the Upper Valley
Following the Battle of First Kernstown on March 23, 1862, Confederate Major General Thomas J. “Stonewall” Jackson retreated to Mount Jackson, Virginia. Federal Maj. Gen. Nathaniel Banks, reinforced significantly, pursued Jackson. By mid-April, Jackson continued his withdrawal, eventually establishing his camps at Swift Run Gap in the Blue Ridge Mountains. Meanwhile, Banks moved south to Harrisonburg where he would remain until early May.
Jackson’s challenge now was to hold the Shenandoah Valley for the Confederate States of America, and to prevent Federal forces then stationed in the Valley and in western Virginia from moving east to support Maj. Gen. George B. McClellan’s campaign against Richmond. Of immediate concern to Jackson was the possibility that Banks would link up with troops in the newly formed Mountain Division, commanded by Maj. Gen. John C. Fremont. The vanguard of Fremont’s command, under Brigadier General Robert Milroy, was already pushing east towards Staunton, an important rail and supply center for the Confederacy.
On April 29, 1862, Jackson telegraphed General Robert E. Lee, military advisor to Confederate President Jefferson Davis, laying out three different plans for dealing with the Union threat: unite with Brig. Gen. Edward “Allegheny” Johnson’s command west of Staunton and strike Milroy; join forces with Maj. Gen. Richard Ewell’s division – over 8,000 strong and already moving towards the Valley to reinforce Jackson - and head north in the Valley, taking on Banks’s Federals; or link up with Ewell and move up the eastern side of the Blue Ridge, threatening Banks’s line of communication. Lee left the final decision to Jackson as to which plan to adopt, and Jackson chose the first: unite with Johnson and move against Milroy.
On April 30th, as Ewell’s division was approaching Swift Run Gap, Jackson led his command south, then east, across the Blue Ridge, to Mechum’s Station, a stop on the Virginia Central Railroad and not too far from Charlottesville, Virginia. To Banks this showed that Jackson was leaving the Shenandoah Valley – and the Federal general reported it as such to Washington, D.C. – but Jackson’s move was a ruse. Once at Mechum’s, the bulk of Jackson’s force boarded railroad cars and returned to Staunton in the Valley. Part of Jackson’s command had to march, but by May 5th, Jackson had all of his troops in Staunton.
Believing Jackson gone from the Shenandoah Valley, the authorities in Washington ordered Banks to withdraw down the Valley to Strasburg, and to send the division commanded by Brig. Gen. James Shields back east.
On May 7, 1862, Jackson, now numbering some 11,600 after joining forces with Johnson, started moving west on the Staunton-Parkersburg Turnpike. As Jackson’s column marched, there was some skirmishing with Milroy’s outposts, but in the late morning of May 8th Jackson reached the outskirts of McDowell. Around noon Jackson, Johnson, Jedediah Hotchkiss, Jackson’s cartographer, and a small number of Confederate infantrymen scaled Sitlington Hill, an elevation that rose nearly 600 feet above the level plain below and dominated the immediate area. Reconnoitering Milroy’s camps in and around McDowell a mile distant, Jackson determined that he would attack the Federals the next day, but Milroy beat him to the punch.
Realizing that he was outnumbered, Milroy convinced Brig. Gen. Robert Schenck, whose brigade arrived at mid-morning (with Schenck, Milroy could count perhaps 4,500 troops) that the best defense was a “spoiling attack,” attack the Confederates, catch them off-guard, then retreat after dark. Milroy was also concerned with reports that Confederate artillery was being positioned on Sitlington Hill; from there, enemy cannon could easily hit the Federal camps in McDowell.
At 4:30 p.m. on May 8, 1862, five Union regiments, some 2,500 infantrymen, supported by artillery, moved out, crossed the Bull Pasture River, and began marching up Sitlington Hill. It was not easy. Nathaniel C. McLean, Colonel of the 75th Ohio Infantry, and in charge of the attack, remembered that the “side of the mountain up which I was compelled to attack was entirely destitute of protection, either from trees or rocks, and so steep that the men were at times compelled to march either to one side or the other in order to make the assault.”
For many Federal and Confederate soldiers at McDowell, this was their introduction to battle, and probably would have echoed Colonel George H. Smith of the 25th Virginia Infantry, who wrote that “this was my first fight, and I hardly knew what to do.” Despite the lack of experience, McDowell saw intense combat, starting before 6 p.m. and lasting well after dark. One participant recalled that the “sheets of flame shot from the angry mouths of the guns, lighting up the whole side.”
Although the Confederates were defending, they suffered higher casualties. This was primarily due to several factors: for one, as the sun set in the west, behind the Union lines, Confederates were silhouetted against the clear sky to the east. Next, because Confederates stood above their Union foe, they tended to overshoot; and finally, most of the Federal infantry were armed with rifled muskets, while many Confederates were still armed with smoothbores. (One Confederate regiment, the 12th Georgia Infantry, took especially high casualties.)
Action along the Staunton-Parkersburg Turnpike saw the 3rd Virginia (Union) face skirmishers from the 31st Virginia. Some members from both regiments had been recruited in Clarksburg - where “Stonewall” Jackson was born – so while exchanging volleys, they also called out their former neighbors by name.
The fighting continued after dark, but close to 9 p.m., as Federal soldiers began to run low on ammunition, Milroy ordered his men to withdraw. They pulled back into McDowell, bringing as many of their wounded with them as they could, and before 2 a.m. on May 9th, the Federal retreat to Franklin, Virginia, began. Jackson moved into the village of McDowell the next morning, assigning to the Virginia Military Institute cadets, who were present at the battle but had not taken part in the fighting, the unpleasant task of burying the dead and dealing with the wounded, Federal casualties at McDowell numbered 256, while the Confederates suffered 532. Of that number, the 12th Georgia Infantry lost 175.
On the morning of May 9th, Jackson sent news to Richmond, writing, “God blessed our arms with victory at McDowell yesterday.” This victory was received with great jubilation, for the Confederacy had experienced numerous setbacks that spring: a Union blockade that was starting to take effect; the loss of Memphis, Island No. 10, and New Orleans along the Mississippi River; the defeat at Shiloh; and McClellan’s Army of the Potomac inching its way up towards Richmond. Jackson’s victory at McDowell did much to raise Southern morale; it also stopped the Federal advance into the Upper Valley, and to Staunton.
The next day, May 10th, Jackson began his pursuit of the Federal forces, following them to Franklin. Satisfied that they had been dealt with for the time being, Jackson turned back to McDowell, and then to Staunton. Now Jackson could turn his attention to Banks, and that is exactly what he would do.
Last updated: May 12, 2023