Fredericksburg, Battle of

Fredericksburg, Battle of (1862).After repelling the Confederates at the battles of Antietam, Perryville, and Corinth, the Union forces in the fall of 1862 renewed their offensives against Richmond, Chattanooga, and Vicksburg. President Abraham Lincoln replaced Gen. George B. McClellan with Gen. Ambrose Burnside in November 1862 in command of the Army of the Potomac. Burnside proposed to move toward Fredericksburg, Virginia, as a preliminary to an offensive against Richmond. Moving quickly, his army covered 40 miles in two days, leaving Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee guessing as to its destination, but confused orders and bureaucratic bungling delayed the arrival of pontoons for bridging the Rappahannock River for a week. These delays and Burnside's own indecisiveness allowed Lee to concentrate his forces and establish strong defensive positions on the hills behind Fredericksburg.

In the early morning of 11 December, Burnside's engineers began laying pontoon bridges. A heavy artillery bombardment and a crossing on the upper bridges by a Union brigade drove out the Confederate defenders. On the evening of 11 December and throughout 12 December, Federal troops moved into position in Fredericksburg. For the next several days, the soldiers thoroughly sacked the city.

On 13 December, Burnside ordered William B. Franklin to attack the Confederate right. However, carelessly drafted orders and Franklin's own lack of initiative led to delay and a weak assault with only one division. Despite these problems, however, George Gordon Meade's men poured through a gap in Gen. Thomas Jackson's line. A vigorous Confederate counterattack drove Meade's unsupported division back, and twilight ended the fighting on this part of the field.

While waiting impatiently for news of Franklin's attack, Burnside ordered Edwin Summer to take Marye's Heights in the rear of Fredericksburg. Around noon, William French's division moved through the streets toward a sunken road and stone wall at the base of Marye's Heights. French's brigades were thrown back by well‐placed Confederate artillery fire and what many participants described as a “sheet of flame” from Georgia and North Carolina infantry stationed behind a stone wall. Assaults by parts of five more Union divisions proved equally disastrous. Several generals talked Burnside out of leading the Ninth Corps in a desperate attack the following day, and by 16 December the Army of the Potomac had been withdrawn from Fredericksburg.

Although the battle had cost the Confederates over 5,000 casualties, the Federals had lost nearly 13,000. Historians have long criticized Burnside for both rashness and indecisiveness, yet the Union general was badly served by several subordinates. Some believe his battle plan stood a reasonable chance of success if properly executed. Whatever the merits of this argument, the results of the battle in the North were demoralization and political recrimination. For the Confederates, a relatively easy victory added to public confidence while producing fresh rumors of foreign mediation and peace negotiations.
[See also Civil War: Military and Diplomatic Course.]

Bibliography

Frank A. O’Reilly , “Stonewall” Jackson at Fredericksburg: The Battle of Prospect Hill, 1993.
Gary W. Gallagher, ed., Decision on the Rappahannock: Causes and Consequences of the Fredericksburg Campaign, 1995.

George C. Rable