RICHARD HERON ANDERSON

(October 7, 1821–June 26, 1879)

 

Confederate General

 

“Fighting Dick” Anderson was one of Robert E. Lee’s favorite and most trusted commanders, almost never defeated in battle. His skilled night march to Spotsylvania Court House saved Richmond for the Confederacy and baffled superior Union forces.

 

Richard Heron Anderson was born in Statesburg, Sumter District, South Carolina, the grandson of an American Revolutionary War officer. He was admitted to the U.S. Military Academy in 1838 and graduated fortieth in a class of 56 four years later. Anderson was then commissioned a second lieutenant in the First U.S. Dragoon Regiment and, after training at the Cavalry School in Carlisle, Pennsylvania, was posted to Little Rock, Arkansas, in 1843. After three years of active service on the frontier, Anderson joined Gen. Winfield Scott’s army during the final phases of the Mexican War. He landed with Scott’s army at Vera Cruz, fought his way inland, and won brevet promotion to first lieutenant for distinguished service at St. Augustin Atlapulco on August 17, 1847. After the war, Anderson transferred north as a cavalry instructor at Carlisle until 1852. That year he joined the Second U.S. Dragoons, rose to captain in 1855, and fulfilled routine garrison duty at various posts in Texas, New Mexico, and Kansas until 1857. Following a brief return to Carlisle, Anderson next accompanied Col. Albert Sidney Johnston on an expedition against the Mormons in Utah in 1858–1859. The following year he was posted to Fort Kearney, Nebraska, where he remained until the eve of the Civil War.

 

South Carolina seceded from the Union in December 1860, an act placing Anderson’s family under tremendous strain. Although a Southerner, he disapproved of slavery and was lukewarm toward secession. However, peer pressure convinced him to resign his commission in February 1861 and support the Confederate cause. Accordingly, he became colonel of the First South Carolina Regiment and was present under Gen. Pierre G.T. Beauregard during the fateful bombardment of Fort Sumter on April 12, 1861. The following month he succeeded Beauregard as commander at Charleston, was raised to brigadier general, and then ordered to Florida under Gen. Braxton Bragg. On October 9, 1861, Anderson directed a moderately successful night attack upon Union forces outside Fort Pickens, although he sustained an arm injury. In the spring of 1862 Anderson’s military fortunes greatly advanced when he was ordered to Virginia as part of a division commander by a former West Point classmate, Gen. James Longstreet. He was now part of the soon-to-be legendary Army of Northern Virginia.

 

Throughout the spring of 1862, Anderson’s brigade was heavily engaged in fighting around Richmond, the Confederate capital. He skillfully directed his troops during defensive actions at Williamsburg on May 5, 1862, and at Seven Pines, three weeks later, his men scored the deepest penetration of Union lines. “The attack of the two brigades under Gen. R. H. Anderson was made with such spirit and regularity as to have driven back the most determined foe,” Longstreet reported. “This decided the day in our favor.” Having further distinguished himself during the Seven Days battles against the army of Gen. George B. McClellan, Anderson gained promotion to major general as of July 14, 1862, and also assumed command of the division under Benjamin Huger. He was in the thick of fighting at Second Manassas in August 1861, where Union forces under Gen. John Pope were routed, and also accompanied Gen. Thomas “Stonewall” Jackson’s movement against Harpers Ferry, West Virginia. With that vital objective secured, Anderson next conducted a rapid forced march to rejoin Robert E. Lee’s army at Antietam on September 17, 1862. His troops were welcome reinforcements for the hard-pressed forces of Gen. Daniel H. Hill, but he was only on the field for a few minutes before sustaining serious injuries. Anderson recovered within weeks and was present at the December 13, 1862, Battle of Fredericksburg, although lightly engaged. However, his actions of the previous year established him as a fine battle captain. Anderson was roundly praised by fellow generals for aplomb under fire, and they gave him the simple but effective sobriquet “Fighting Dick.”

 

In May 1863, Anderson’s three brigades proved instrumental in fending off the advance of Gen. Joseph Hooker at Chancellorsville and later contributed to the defeat of the Union VI Corps. Lee reorganized his army following the death of Stonewall Jackson (who was accidentally shot by his own troops at Chancellorsville), and Anderson’s division was shifted over to a corps commanded by Gen. Ambrose P. Hill. In this capacity he was heavily engaged in the second day of fighting at Gettysburg. After much hard fighting, Anderson’s men swept Gen. Daniel Sickles off Seminary Ridge and briefly occupied the strategic heights of Cemetery Hill before being repulsed. On the climactic third day of fighting he supported Gen. George E. Pickett’s unsuccessful thrust against the Union center and subsequently withdrew to Virginia with the survivors of Lee’s forces.

The spring of 1864 witnessed the advent of a new adversary, Ulysses S. Grant, who launched an ambitious drive to capture Richmond and end the war. Heavy fighting—and losses—ensued for both sides at the Wilderness, where Longstreet was wounded. Anderson received temporary promotion to lieutenant general to succeed him and performed his greatest work at the Battle of Spotsylvania Court House. On May 7, 1864, his deployment at a strategic road junction proved critical, for by dint of hard marching he arrived just ahead of Union forces converging there. This prevented Union troops from cutting off the bulk of Lee’s forces from Richmond. Once committed to combat, Anderson’s men were also active in repulsing superior forces under Gens. John Sedgewick and Gouverneur K. Warren in another bloody stalemate. Longstreet returned to the field that October, and Anderson received command of the new Fourth Corps of two divisions. With it he gained additional distinction in the trenches before Petersburg and Richmond. Once Lee was finally forced to abandon the Confederate capital in April 1865, it fell upon Anderson to cover his withdrawal. Unfortunately, he was set upon by superior Union forces under Gen. Philip H. Sheridan at Sayler’s Creek and soundly defeated on April 6, 1865. Anderson managed to cut his way back to Lee’s lines, but a last-minute consolidation of Confederate units left him without a command. Lee then allowed “Fighting Dick” to retire from the army and return home, sparing him the final indignity of Appomattox.

After the war, Anderson failed to make a living as a planter and found himself in desperate straits financially. For months thereafter he had no recourse but to work as a common laborer with the South Carolina Railroad in Camden. Modest and uncomplaining, he lived in poverty with his ailing wife until 1875, when political allies secured him an appointment as state phosphate inspector. This brought him a small measure of financial security, but Anderson died in near obscurity at Beaufort, South Carolina, on June 26, 1879. His battlefield record establishes him as one of the finest divisional leaders among the Confederate armies.

Bibliography

Elliott, Joseph C. Lieutenant General Richard Heron Anderson: Lee’s Noble Soldier. Dayton, OH: Morningside House, 1985; Gallagher, Gary W. Lee and His Army in Confederate History. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2001; Gallagher, Gary W., ed., The Second Day at Gettysburg: Essays on Confederate and Union Military Leadership. Kent, OH: Kent State University Press, 1993; Hassler, William W. “‘Fighting Dick’ Anderson.” Civil War Times Illustrated 12, no. 2 (1974): 4–6, 40–43; Matter, William D. If It Takes All Summer: The Battle for Spotsylvania. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1988; Pfannes, Harry W. Gettysburg—Culp’s Hill and Cemetery Ridge. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1993; Rhea, Gordon C. The Battle of the Wilderness, May 5–6, 1864. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1994; Sommers, Richard. Richmond Redeemed: The Siege of Petersburg. Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1981; Trudeau, Noah A. The Last Citadel: Petersburg, Virginia, June 1864–April 1865. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1993; Weinert, Richard P. The Confederate Regular Army. Shippensburg, PA: White Mane, 1991.

SIEGE OF DERRY 1688–1689

 

In the Glorious Revolution of 1688, King James II of England (James VII of Scotland), a Roman Catholic convert, was ousted from power by his Protestant daughter Mary and her husband William of Orange.

Richard Talbot, 1st Earl of Tyrconnell, who was acting as King James’ Viceroy in Ireland, was anxious to ensure that all strong points in the country were held by garrisons completely loyal to King James.

 

By November 1688, the walled city of Derry was the only one in Ireland whose garrison was not completely loyal to James II. The Earl of Antrim was ordered to replace it with a more reliable force. Alexander MacDonnell, 3rd Earl of Antrim, despite his age of 76, responded to this command, but wasted valuable time (several weeks) searching for men who were six feet tall or more. An army of around 1,200 men, mostly “Redshanks” (Highlanders) set out for the city several weeks later.

 

History recounts that 13 apprentice boys seized the city keys and locked the gates while the approaching army was within shouting distance. Whatever happened, on 7 December 1688 the Catholic army found the city gates locked, and the siege began. A policy of ‘no surrender’ was confirmed by the city’s mayor.

 

On 10 December, King James fled London. He was caught, but escaped a second time on 23 December and made his way to France. James’ first cousin, King Louis XIV of France, gave him support to retain his crown. In London on 13 February 1689, a gathering of English politicians calling itself a “Convention,” but acting as a Parliament [1], declared that King James had abdicated by trying to flee on 10 December and offered the Crown of England jointly to both William and to Mary. The couple was then proclaimed King William III and Queen Mary II.

 

On 11 April the Scottish Parliament met and came to the same conclusion, proclaiming William and Mary to be King William II and Queen Mary II of Scotland. On the same day, William and Mary were crowned joint King and Queen in Westminster Abbey by the Bishop of London. The Archbishops of Canterbury and York continued to recognise James as King of England and Scotland.

 

On March 12, 1689, James landed in Kinsale, Ireland, with 6000 French soldiers. He took Dublin and marched north with a Jacobite army of Irish Catholics and Frenchmen. The army arrived at Derry on 18 April 1689 and summoned the city to surrender. James was rebuffed, and some of the city’s defenders fired at him. The siege began in earnest, and for 105 days the city suffered appalling conditions. Cannonballs and mortar-bombs rained down, and famine and disease took their toll.

 

The Governor of the City, Lieutenant-Colonel Robert Lundy, favoured a concession to James, writing on the 15th of April that “without an immediate supply of money and provisions this place must fall very soon into the enemy’s hands.” Lundy called a meeting with several of his most loyal supporters to discuss surrender. News of the meeting spread, enraging the citizens. After several weeks of guarding himself day and night for fear of his safety, Lundy fled the city under cover of darkness by climbing down a pear tree that grew against the city wall. The city’s defence was retaken up under the direction of Major Henry Baker and Colonel Adam Murray, along with the Rev. George Walker, who also held the rank of major, under the slogan “No Surrender”.

 

British warships under Percy Kirke arrived off Derry on 11 June 1689 but refused to risk shore guns. Another 47 days later, under the orders of the Dutch Marshal Frederic Schomberg, three armed merchant ships called the Mountjoy, Phoenix and Jerusalem sailed up the Foyle, protected by the frigate HMS Dartmouth under Captain (and future Admiral) John Leake. The ‘Mountjoy’, rammed and broke the barricading boom at Culmore Fort, which had been stretched across the river and relieved the siege on July 28 1689.

The city had endured 105 days of siege during which some 4000 people (apparently about half the population) were said to have died.

 

THE SIEGE OF DERRY (1688-1689)

From A Concise History of Ireland by P. W. Joyce Published 1909

625. Tirconnell took immediate measures to secure Ireland for King James. He raised and armed an army of Catholics, and disarmed the Protestants. He took possession of most of the important places through the country; but the people of Enniskillen refused to admit his garrison. Then began the War of the Revolution.

626. Lord Antrim marched to take possession of Derry; but while the aldermen and magistrates were hesitating, a few of the bolder young apprentices seizing the keys, locked the town gates on the 7th of December 1688, and shut out Antrim and his Jacobite forces.

627. In February 1689. lieutenant-general Richard Hamilton was sent north by Tirconnell to reduce Ulster, where the Protestants were now making preparations for defence; and having captured some places and been repulsed in others, he arrived near Derry.

628. Meantime king James sailed for Ireland from Brest with 100 French officers, 1,200 Irish refugees, arms and ammunition for 10,000 men, and a supply of money. Among the French officers were De Rosen and the French ambassador count d’Avaux. Among the Irish were Patrick Sarsfield, the two Hamiltons, and the two Luttrells. James landed at Kinsale on the 12th March 1689, and passing through Cork, proceeded to Dublin.

629. Having visited Derry in April, where he found his army engaged in the siege, he returned to Dublin and summoned a parliament. During the short sitting of this parliament, from the 7th May to the 20th of July, the following measures, among others, were passed:–Poynings’ Law (308) was repealed. There was to be full freedom of worship.

The Act of settlement (609) was repealed, whereby the new settlers would have to restore the lands to the old owners. A number of persons–2,445 in all–were attainted, and their lands declared confiscated, for having joined the prince of Orange. But all this active legislation came to nothing; for before there was time to enforce it, king James and his government were superseded.

630. To meet current expenses a tax was levied on estates. But as this was not enough, the king seized some coming machines, and issued base coins, each representing £5, which all persons were obliged to take in exchange for goods, though their actual value was only about four pence. This unwise measure did great mischief and ruined hundreds of traders.

631. Meantime the siege of Derry which had been commenced on the 18th of April 1689, was carried on in good earnest by Hamilton, who was afterwards joined by De Rosen. It has been related how the gates had been shut by a few young apprentices. But there were many among the authorities who did not approve of this action; and colonel Lundy the governor had from the beginning made himself intensely unpopular by recommending surrender, so that he had at last to make his escape over the wall by night in disguise.

632. The command then devolved on major Baker and captain Murray. The feeble-hearted town council were still for surrender; when the humbler citizens–those of the class who at first had shut the gates–with Murray at their head, took the matter into their own hands and resolved on resistance. The besiegers began their work vigorously the walls and town were battered by their cannon; many houses took fire; and people were struck down everywhere in the streets. But the greater the danger and distress the higher seemed to rise the spirits of the defenders. They were encouraged by the clergy, among the most active of whom was the Rev. George Walker, who kept constantly exhorting the people from both pulpit and rampart.

633. During May and June the fighting went on daily; there were sallies by the besieged, and attempts to storm by the besiegers, with desperate conflicts and great loss of life. Such was the spirit of the defenders that the women sometimes assisted, handing ammunition and refreshments to the men; and armed with stones and all sorts of first-to-hand missiles, they mixed in the fights as boldly as their sons, brothers, and husbands.

634. But soon provisions began to run short; and there was no way of procuring a supply; for the town was quite surrounded except on the river side; and here the besiegers had cut off communication by a great boom composed of strong cables and logs of timber bound together, stretched tightly from bank to bank.

635. Every day watchmen took station on the church tower, anxiously looking out to sea for relief; and at length in the middle of June they shouted down the joyous news that thirty ships were sailing up Lough Foyle. But the hopes of the citizens were short-lived; for major-general Kirke the commander of the fleet, hearing of the boom and of the armed enemies and forts lining the river banks all the way up to the town, refused to proceed farther.

636. For forty-six days he lay idle in the lough, while the townspeople were famishing, driven to eat horseflesh, dogs, grease, and garbage of every kind. The garrison fared no better. Yet these brave young fellows–ragged and starving–stood resolutely to their posts, and had never a thought of yielding.

The fighting at last ceased, and it now became a question of starving the defenders into surrender.

637. On the evening of the 30th of July, when silence, gloom, and despair had settled down on the town, the watchers were startled by a bright flash down the river, followed by the roar of artillery; and a hungry multitude, rushing eagerly to the battlements, saw relief approaching. For Kirke had at last taken heart and sent three ships with provisions. In spite of the destructive fire from both sides, the ships approached full sail, crashed through the boom, and relieved the town. Next day Hamilton marched away. Thus ended, on the 31st of July 1689, a siege of 105 days, one of the most famous in Irish or British history.

638. The ancient walls of Derry are still perfect, though the town has extended far beyond them; and on the site of one of the bastions, rises a lofty pillar surmounted by a statue of the Rev. George Walker.

639. Enniskillen, the other Williamite garrison, was threatened by the approach of an Irish army; but the Enniskilleners, marching forth on the very day of the relief of Derry, intercepted and utterly defeated them at Newtownbutler. Sarsfield, who commanded a detachment at Sligo, on hearing of these disasters, retired to Athlone; and now Ulster was nearly all in the hands of the Williamites.

Aachen: the Stolberg Corridor

 

General der Panzertruppen Erich Brandenberger commanded the 7th Army through the Ardennes campaign.

 

Gen Lt Graf Gerhard von Schwerin commanded the 116th Panzer Division during the initial defense of Aachen.

September 12-29 1944

The Aachen corridor was defended by the 7th Army, commanded by Gen Erich Brandenberger. Model derided him as “a typical product of the general staff system” and his traditional style did not earn him the favor of Hitler. Yet Brandenberger had a fine combat record, leading the 8th Panzer Division during the invasion of Russia in 1941 and commanding the 29th Army Corps in Russia for a year before being given command of the 7th Army.

 

One of Brandenberger’s initial tasks was to restore some measure of order amongst his edgy corps and divisional commanders. The “void” of late August and early September had left many divisional commanders to operate on their own initiative and it was Brandenberger’s task to reestablish iron discipline. A good example of the confused temper of the time was the fate of the highly respected but headstrong commander of the 116th Panzer Division, Gen Lt Graf Gerhard von Schwerin. The young count already had a reputation for being more concerned about the fate of his troops than for instructions from higher headquarters, and during the abortive Panzer counteroffensive around Mortain in the summer, had been relieved for flaunting instructions on the disposition of his division. Following the Falaise debacle, he was reappointed commander, but, during the short-lived defense of Liege, he again frustrated the corps commanders by his independent actions. It was well known among the divisional officers that Schwerin did not want to continue fighting on German soil for fear of the desolation that would ensue. When Schwerin first took command of the Aachen defenses on September 12, he found that Nazi party leaders and police had already abandoned the city and that the civilian population was in chaos; he halted the exodus out of the city, not realizing that it had been Hitler who had ordered it. Hoping that the city would be abandoned rather than defended to the last, he left a message with a city official intended for the US Army asking them “to take care of the unfortunate population in a humane way.” Unfortunately, on September 15 the Nazi party leaders and some police skulked back into the city and discovered the note. They accused Schwerin of defeatism and tried to haul him before a “People’s Court.” Schwerin ignored them and later in the month presented himself to Seventh Army headquarters for a military tribunal. Appreciating Schwerin’s gallantry, Rundstedt proposed reinstating him to divisional command. However, in the paranoid climate around Hitler after the officers’ bomb plot, he was sent for a while to the “doghouse” the OKW officers’ pool-until things cooled off. He later commanded a Panzergrenadier division and a corps in Italy. Brandenberger also relieved Gen Schack of command of 81st Corps on September 20 due to his connection with the Schwerin affair.

 

 

The unification of command of these disparate units did not take place until early September, with the reconstitution of the 7th Army. Following the encirclement in the Falaise pocket and the deeper envelopment on the Seine, the German 7th Army ceased to exist and its remnants were attached to the 5th Panzer Army. On September 4, 1944, it was reconstructed under Gen Erich Brandenberger and assigned the task of defending the Westwall in the Maastricht-Aachen-Bitburg sector, with its 81st Corps covering from the Herzogenrath-Dueren area, the 74th Corps from Roetgen to Ormont and the 1st SS-Panzer Corps in the Schnee Eifel from Ormont to the 1st Army boundary near Diekirch. The 81st Corps covered the sector attacked by the US VII and XIX Corps and most of its main combat elements were still withdrawing through Belgium into the second week of September. The 353rd Infantry Division had little more than its headquarter elements, so the 81st Corps used it to man the Westwall defenses in the Aachen area by assigning it the various Luftwaffe and Landesschuetzen battalions. The northern sector facing the US XIX Corps was held by two significantly under strength infantry divisions, the 49th and 275th. The 49th Infantry Division had been trapped in the Mons pocket, and by the time it reached the German frontier it had only about 1,500 men, mostly from the headquarters and support elements. The 275th Infantry Division suffered terribly in Normandy and by August it was described as “practically destroyed.” It was partly rebuilt and by mid September had only one infantry regiment. It had a divisional strength of 5,000 men and a combat strength of about 1,800 men but its field artillery was limited to a single battery of 105mm howitzers.[1]

 

 

The principal units facing the US VII Corps were the 116th Panzer Division, centered around Aachen, and the 9th Panzer Division in the Stolberg corridor. The 116th Panzer Division was the best-equipped unit in this sector, but, when it took control of the defense of Aachen in mid September, it had a combat strength of about 1,600 men, with its Panzergrenadier battalions about half-strength and only three PzKpfw IV tanks, two Panther tanks, and two StuG III assault guns. Reinforcements in the third week of September reestablished its combat strength in infantry, but it was down to only about 2,000 liters (500 gallons) of fuel, leaving it immobilized. The 9th Panzer Division was still withdrawing through Belgium and was a mere skeleton. Its armored strength had been reduced to eight operational Panther tanks, and six StuG III assault guns; its two Panzergrenadier regiments were down to about three companies. The division was so weak that the 7th Army reinforced it with the remnants of Panzer Brigade 105, which had lost most of its Panzergrenadiers and was down to five Panther tanks and three assault guns. After the surviving battlegroup withdrew across the frontier, the division was rebuilt with a hodgepodge of territorial and Luftwaffe units in its sector.

 

Recognizing the weakness of the units assigned to the 81st Corps, the 7th Army attempted to reinforce the Aachen sector as soon as resources became available, and three divisions were assigned in mid September. The first to arrive was the 12th Infantry Division, which had been reconstituted in East Prussia in the late summer after heavy combat on the Russian Front.

Its arrival in the Aachen sector starting on September 14 was a major morale boost for the locale civilian population, as the division was fully equipped with young, new soldiers. The two other divisions were the 183rd and 246th Volksgrenadier divisions (VGD). The 183rd VGD arrived in the sector on September 22 and was assigned to take over the Geilenkirchen sector from the 275th Infantry Division, which was then shifted to cover a gap on the corps’ southern wing in the Huertgen forest. The 183rd VGD was moved from Bohemia starting on September 23. Its arrival permitted the 116th Panzer Division to be gradually pulled out of the line for refitting and to serve as the corps reserve.

 

7th Army: General der Panzertruppe Erich Brandenberger

81st Corps: Generalleutnant Friederich-August Schack

49th Infantry Division: Generalleutnant Siegfried Macholz

275th Infantry Division: Generalleutnant Hans Schmidt

116th Panzer Division: Generalleutnant Graf Gerhard von Schwerin

9th Panzer Division: Generalmajor Gerhard Muller

353rd Infantry Division: Generalleutnant Paul Mahlmann

Reinforcements after September 14

12th Infantry Division: Colonel Gerhard Engel

183rd Volksgrenadier Division: Generalleutnant Wolfgang Lange

 

 

[1] The Wehrmacht defined combat strength as the number of frontline combat troops; it did not include non-combat elements, so, for example, a full-strength infantry division with 14,800 men had a combat strength of 3,800.

 

 

THE FIRST BATTLE OF AACHEN

 

The first US troops to reach German soil were a reconnaissance patrol of the 5th Armored Division, which crossed the River Our near Stalzemburg on the German-Luxembourg border on September 11, 1944. Although the V Corps made several other penetrations, on September 17 Gen Gerow halted any further attacks in this sector, realizing that his forces were too limited to conduct any deep penetration of the defenses in the wooded, mountainous terrain of the Eifel. After a few brief days of fighting, the Ardennes-Eifel front turned quiet, and would remain so for three months until the start of the German Ardennes offensive in this area on December 16.

Collins’ VII Corps was moving on a 35-mile-wide front towards the Aachen corridor and began battalion-sized reconnaissance probes against the Scharnhorst Line of the Westwall on September 12. Aachen had been Charlemagne’s capital and the imperial city of the kings of Germania from 936 to 1531; as a result Hitler was adamant that the city be defended. On September 16, Hitler issued a Fuehrer directive. There was no room for strategic maneuver now that the enemy had reached German soil: every man was to “stand fast or die at his post.” To facilitate the defense, Hitler ordered the civilians evacuated and by mid September, the population had fallen from 165,000 to about 20,000. The German 81st Corps assumed that the main US objective would be the city, and so assigned the defense to its best unit, the 116th Panzer Division, which began arriving on September 12.

 

In fact, the main objective of the VII Corps was to push up the Stolberg corridor with the aim of reaching the River Roer. The Combat Command B (CCB) of the 3rd Armored Division began moving forward at dawn on September 13, gradually battering its way up the Stolberg corridor. Closest to the city, the 16th Infantry stalled along the Westwall in the Aachen municipal forest. The penetrations accelerated over the next few days. The 1st Infantry Division pushed through the bunkers in the Aachen municipal forest, with two of its regiments reaching the southern outskirts of the city, while the 16th Infantry furthest east reached Ellendorf at the edge of the Schill Line. CCA of the 3rd Armored Division had the most dramatic gains, pushing all the way to the southern edge of Eilendorf to await infantry reinforcements. CCB of the 3rd Armored Division pushed northward out of the Monschau forest advancing with one task force into Kornelimunster and the other to the outskirts of Vicht. German resistance varied considerably; some of the Landesschiitz territorial defense battalions evaporated on contact, while small rearguards from regular army units fought tenaciously. On September 15, both combat commands of the 3rd Armored Division penetrated into the Schill Line, with CCA coming under determined fire from StuG III assault guns holding the high ground near Geisberg, while the CCB’s lead task force was stopped by tank fire from Hill 238 west of Gressenich. The 9th Panzer Division claimed the destruction of 42 US tanks that day - an exaggeration, but also a clear indication of the intensity of the fighting.

With the attack up the Stolberg corridor proceeding well, the 9th Infantry Division began a methodical advance into the Hurtgen forest on the right flank of the 3rd Armored Division, moving through both the Scharnhorst and Schill lines as far north as Schevenhuette. The attempt to clear the Huertgen forest gradually ground to a halt after encountering 32 elements of the 89th Infantry Division in bunkers of the Schill Line. Even though the German defenders were outnumbered, the we11placed bunkers considerably amplified their combat effectiveness. The determined defense by the regular infantry was a complete contrast to earlier fighting against the initial Scharnhorst Line where local territorial defense units were not so resolute.

By now Gen Schack of the 81st Corps realized that the main US goal was to push through the Stolberg corridor, but the presence of the 1st Infantry Division on the doorstep of Aachen and the constant American shelling of the city suggested that the capture of the city was also an American objective. As a result, he kept Schwerin’s 116th Panzer Division defending the city instead of attacking the flank of the American assault. The momentum of the battle shifted on September 17 following the arrival of the 12th VGD. This fresh, full-strength division had been allotted by Hitler to ensure the defense of Aachen, and was commanded by one of Hitler’s former military adjutants, Col Engel. Although Schack attempted to keep it intact for a decisive action, he was forced to commit it piecemeal, and an initial Fusilier Regiment 27 counterattack was beaten back with heavy losses. The arrival of these critical reinforcements permitted counterattacks all along the American lines, including determined attacks against the US 9th Infantry Division near Schevenhuette by Grenadier Regiment (GR) 48. With his own troops overextended and short of ammunition, Collins ordered his troops to consolidate their positions on the evening of September 17, except for the 9th Infantry Division still fighting in the Huertgen. Skirmishes continued over the next few days with little movement as both sides tried to wrest control of key geographic features, such as the hills around Stolberg, and the towns of Verlautenheide and Schevenhuette. The Wehrmacht succeeded in halting the advance, but at a heavy cost in infantry. The newly arrived 12th VGD dropped in combat strength from 34 3,800 to 1,900 riflemen, and the 9th Panzer Division and its attachments lost over a thousand men, equivalent to about two-thirds of their combat strength compared to a week earlier.

Collins hoped that the 9th Infantry Division could push southeast out of the Huertgen forest and seize the towns in the clearing on the road to Duren. With the fighting along the Stolberg corridor stalemated, the continuing US advance in the woods attracted the attention of the Seventh Army commander, Gen Brandenberger, who scraped up a few assault guns to reinforce the patchwork 353rd Infantry Division holding these towns. Both sides were badly overextended and exhausted, and small advantages could have a disproportionate effect. After repeated attempts, the 9th Infantry Division’s push east through the wooded hills was halted short of the Huertgen-Kleinhau clearings, ending the first attempt to clear the Huertgen forest.

While most of the fighting by the US First Army had been concentrated in the VII Corps sector, Corlett’s XIX Corps had taken advantage of the weak German defenses in the southern Netherlands to push up to the Westwall. In spite of the severe fuel shortages, the 2nd Armored Division pushed beyond the Albert Canal to Geilenkirchen, while on its right flank the 30th Division pushed towards Rimburg, an advance of some 15 to 33 miles in ten days. Nevertheless, German resistance was continuing to harden, and the XIX Corps was unable to intervene in the fighting around Aachen as a result.

With the launch of Operation Market Garden further north in the Netherlands by the 21st Army Group on September 17, US operations against the Westwall came to a halt for the rest of September. Low on supplies, out of fuel, overextended by the vagaries of the summer advance, and now facing a much more vigorous defense, it was time to recuperate and take stock. On September 22, Gen Hodges made this official, with instructions to shut down the remaining offensive operations in the VII Corps and XIX Corps sectors. During the final week of September, the US forces in the Aachen sector reorganized with the arrival of the Ninth Army. The new army was wedged between the British 21st Army Group to the north in the Netherlands, and the US First Army around Aachen.

PORT REPUBLIC, VIRGINIA

 

Rockingham County, June 9, 1862

By Donald C. Pfanz

Port Republic was the final, climactic battle of CS Major General Thomas J. “Stonewall” Jackson’s 1862 Shenandoah Valley campaign. In early June 1862 Jackson retreated up the Valley, pursued by two forces commanded by US Major General John C. Frémont and US Brigadier General James Shields. Frémont followed Jackson directly up the main valley, while Shields paralleled the Confederate march on the east, up the Luray Valley. By dividing their forces, the Union commanders gave Jackson the offensive opportunity he sought.

The Massanutten Mountain separates the Shenandoah and Luray Valleys. Through the Luray Valley, running between the Blue Ridge Mountains on the east and the Massanutten on the west, is the South Fork of the Shenandoah River, which in June 1862 was spanned by three bridges upstream from Front Royal: two near Luray and one at Conrad’s Store (now Elkton). Jackson’s cavalry destroyed each of these bridges, thus separating Frémont’s and Shields’s forces. The next closest point of crossing was at Port Republic, where the North and South Rivers meet to form the South Fork. Two fords crossed the South River there, and a bridge arched the rain-swollen North River at the northern end of town.

Jackson led his army, now reduced by casualties and straggling to perhaps 12,000 men, to Port Republic where he confidently turned to meet his pursuers. Fighting began on June 8 with Frémont attacking CS Major General Richard S. Ewell’s Division at Cross Keys, four miles northeast of Port Republic, an attack that Ewell handily repulsed.

While Ewell battled Frémont at Cross Keys, Shields’s cavalry dashed into Port Republic, nearly capturing Jackson and his wagon train, which was parked just outside the town. The Federals unlimbered a gun at the foot of the North River bridge and another on the plain east of Port Republic. Jackson engaged these guns with three of his own batteries, then sent CS Colonel Samuel Fulkerson’s 37th Virginia Infantry Regiment charging across the bridge. The Union cavalry scattered in the face of Fulkerson’s attack, abandoning their cannons as they escaped by way of the lower ford. A Union attack on Jackson’s wagon train at the other end of the town was repulsed by the heroic efforts of Jackson’s chief-of-staff, CS Major Robert L. Dabney. The Union cavalrymen retreated to a point approximately two miles east of the town, where they were reinforced later in the day by US Brigadier General Erastus B. Tyler, commanding the vanguard of Shields’s division.

Jackson decided to attack Tyler at first light on June 9. Before dawn he ordered CS Brigadier General Charles Winder’s Brigade to cross the South River and attack Tyler, whose troops held a position on the plain between the South Fork and the Blue Ridge Mountains. Tyler had chosen his position well. His two brigades of 3,000 infantrymen occupied a line a half mile long. Their right flank was on the river, and their left flank was anchored on a commanding knoll known as the Lewiston Coaling, where a local family had recently produced charcoal. Tyler had posted seven guns on the knoll, and as Winder’s Brigade approached, they ripped into its right flank. At the same time Tyler’s infantry opened a withering fire from their position in the field below. The Confederate advance slowed, then came to a halt altogether, as Winder’s dazed men sought some form of shelter on the exposed plain.

Because of a snarl at the South River crossing, Winder’s Brigade initially found itself without support. When CS Brigadier General Richard Taylor’s Louisiana Brigade finally reached the field, Jackson sent one regiment to Winder’s relief, while the rest of the brigade struggled through the tangled woods on the right to attack the smoking guns at the coaling. Winder resumed his stalled offensive. Finding himself outnumbered and pinned down both in front and on his flank, the Marylander ordered his men forward in a desperate attempt to forestall a Union attack on his position—an attack that he had every reason to believe would succeed. Supported by Confederate artillery, he charged to within two hundred yards of the enemy line before being halted by hostile fire. For an hour his men held on, taking heavy losses in an effort to buy Jackson time. Finally, with their ammunition nearly exhausted, the Confederates gave way and rushed in panic to the rear, chased by their opponents.

But once again Confederate reinforcements saved the day. As the Federals streamed forward across the plain in pursuit of Winder, Ewell arrived and struck the Union left flank with two regiments of infantry. At about the same time, the guns located at the coaling fell silent. Taylor had successfully stormed the position by struggling through a jungle of thick mountain laurel for more than an hour. Without pausing to form a proper line, the impetuous Louisianian had charged the guns. He was thrown back, but twice more he led his men forward, and in bloody hand-to-hand fighting they finally captured six of the guns. Tyler, seeing that the battery had been captured, wheeled his line to the left to charge the hill. To Taylor, the advancing blue masses seemed like a solid wall. “There seemed nothing left but to set our backs to the mountain and die hard,” he later recalled. Just when all seemed lost, the sounds of artillery and musketry erupted once more on the plain below. Jackson had rallied Winder’s men and with the help of reinforcements once more moved out to attack the foe.

For the Federals it was too much. Like Winder’s men an hour before, they found themselves outnumbered and attacked on two sides. When the Confederate troops at the coaling added their fire to the melee, the Union line lost all cohesion, and its men broke for the rear. The Confederates pursued them for five miles.

For Jackson the hard-fought battle was won. In the four-hour fight he had lost 800 men while inflicting 500 casualties on the Union army and capturing as many more. Because of the length and severity of the battle, he was unable to recross the river and attack Frémont. His troops were in no condition to fight another battle that day. Realizing this, Jackson burned the North River bridge to prevent its capture by Frémont and withdrew his army to Brown’s Gap, a short distance southeast, to rest and refit his men for future battles.

Jackson’s victory at Port Republic capped a campaign in which he had defeated portions of three Union armies and tied up as many as 60,000 Union soldiers who might have been employed more profitably elsewhere. His success in the Valley changed the military outlook in Virginia and gave the struggling Confederacy new life. Jackson’s army was soon on the move again, toward Richmond.

Estimated Casualties: 800–1,000 US, 800 CS

CROSS KEYS, VIRGINIA

Rockingham County, June 8, 1862

By Donald C. Pfanz

The battle of Cross Keys is perhaps the least famous of the many battles fought by CS Major General Thomas J. “Stonewall” Jackson’s troops in the 1862 Shenandoah Valley campaign. However, the victory secured by Confederate troops there on June 8 was important because it set the stage for Jackson’s victory at Port Republic one day later. Taken together, Cross Keys and Port Republic marked the climax of a campaign that is considered a military masterpiece.

Cross Keys was among the last of a series of victories won by Jackson in the Valley that spring. With an army of just 17,000 men he had defeated Union detachments at McDowell, Front Royal, and Winchester and pushed his confounded opponents back to the Potomac River. Though substantially outnumbered by the Union armies that all but surrounded him, Jackson skillfully used the Valley’s terrain to keep his opponents apart and struck the scattered components of the Union army before they could unite against him.

Such was the strategy he used at Cross Keys. After his victory at Winchester on May 25, Jackson advanced his army to Harpers Ferry on the Potomac River, while Federal troops led by US Major General John C. Frémont and US Brigadier General James Shields converged on the town of Strasburg in an attempt to cut Jackson off and destroy his small army. Jackson’s “foot cavalry” marched more than forty miles in thirty-six hours to elude their trap. The Confederates then retreated up the Shenandoah Valley toward Harrisonburg, pursued by Frémont, while Shields moved by a parallel route up the Luray (or Page) Valley, which lies a few miles to the east. In a skirmish near Harrisonburg on June 6, Jackson’s cavalry commander, CS Brigadier General Turner Ashby, was killed.

Jackson ordered CS Major General Richard S. Ewell to hold back Frémont. Ewell was a career soldier who had previously served at posts on the Plains and in the Southwest desert, where, he claimed, he “had learned all about commanding fifty United States dragoons and forgotten everything else.” The Virginian proved he could handle a division as well as he did a company. On the day of the battle he had about 5,000 men, divided into three infantry brigades commanded by CS Brigadier Generals Arnold Elzey, George H. Steuart, and Isaac R. Trimble, and four batteries of artillery. Ewell decided to block Frémont’s progress at Cross Keys, a rural tavern located seven miles southeast of Harrisonburg. He placed his division in line of battle astride the Port Republic Road on a high, wooded ridge one mile south of the tavern. A shallow stream rippled across his front. In the center of the line, facing open fields, he massed his artillery, supported by Elzey’s Brigade. He posted Steuart’s and Trimble’s Brigades in the woods to his left and right, with Trimble’s Brigade, on the right, slightly advanced.

The battle opened at 9:00 a.m. when Frémont, pushing down the Port Republic Road, collided with Confederate pickets at Union Church near the tavern. The skirmishers fell back stubbornly, allowing Ewell time to complete his defensive arrangements. Finding the Confederates in force, Frémont brought forward his artillery to the hills opposite Ewell’s position and engaged the Confederates in an artillery duel, at the same time deploying his infantry in line of battle southeast of the Keezletown Road. Altogether he had about 10,500 men, divided into six brigades of infantry, one brigade of cavalry, and ten batteries of artillery. Commanding his infantry brigades were US Brigadier Generals Julius Stahel, Henry Bohlen, Robert H. Milroy, Robert C. Schenck, and US Colonels John A. Koltes and Gustave P. Cluseret.

Frémont made a cursory reconnaissance of the battlefield and judged Ewell’s right to be the strategic flank. If he could successfully assail that flank, he could block Ewell’s line of retreat and perhaps destroy the Confederate force. He accordingly ordered Stahel’s brigade forward into the woods east of the Port Republic Road at 11:00 a.m., supported by Bohlen. Stahel soon encountered a line of Confederate skirmishers which he pursued through the woods and across a wheat field toward the main Confederate line. Trimble’s Brigade lay concealed behind a fence at the far edge of that field. Trimble allowed Stahel’s men to approach within fifty yards of his line, then unleashed a savage volley.

Stahel’s men fell back across the field in confusion. When they failed to renew the advance, Trimble seized the initiative and ordered his troops forward. Leaving two regiments in line behind the fence to hold the Union soldiers’ attention, he led the 15th Alabama Volunteers up a nearby ravine to a position opposite Stahel’s left flank. At Trimble’s command, the Alabamians fell upon their unsuspecting foes and forced them back on Bohlen’s brigade, which was advancing to their relief. Reinforced by two regiments from Elzey’s Brigade, Trimble continued the attack, driving the Union troops back toward the Keezletown Road.

While Stahel and Bohlen were giving ground in the face of Trimble’s spirited attacks on the left, Union brigades on the center and right moved forward. Cluseret and Milroy advanced through the woods west of the Port Republic Road and made feeble attacks against Ewell’s center. Schenck’s brigade meanwhile moved up on Milroy’s right in an attempt to turn the left flank of the Confederate line. Ewell took steps to meet this threat. Early in the afternoon Jackson had reinforced him with the brigades of CS Colonel John M. Patton and CS Brigadier General Richard Taylor, and Ewell now hurried portions of these commands to support Steuart’s brigade on his left. They were not needed. Before Schenck could launch his attack, Frémont, shaken by Stahel’s repulse, ordered the Union army to withdraw to a new defensive line along the Keezletown Road. Ewell then advanced the wings of his army to occupy the ground held by Frémont during the battle. Trimble, feisty as ever, implored Ewell to attack the new Union position, but his commander wisely chose to break off the action.

The Union army lost 684 men in the contest; the Confederates, 288. That night Ewell quietly withdrew most of his men from Frémont’s front and marched to Port Republic, where he arrived in time to turn the tide of battle in Jackson’s favor the next day. Frémont took up pursuit early the next morning, marching over the ridge held by Ewell in the previous day’s fight. As his troops tramped over the crest and down the opposite slope, they passed a Confederate field hospital located in a white frame church. By then Jackson and Ewell were engaged in battle with Shields at Port Republic. The sound of the fighting swelled on the wind as Frémont’s men passed the church. In the distance they saw a column of black smoke, where Ewell’s rear guard had set the North River bridge aflame. Unable to cross the river, Frémont’s men looked on helplessly as Jackson and Ewell pursued Shields’s defeated force toward Conrad’s Store.

Estimated Casualties: 684 US, 288 CS