The Battle of Salem Church, took place on May 4 respectively, 1863, in Spotsylvania County, Virginia, as part of the Chancellorsville Campaign of the American Civil War.
After occupying Marye's Heights on May 3, following the Second Battle of Fredericksburg, Maj. Gen. John Sedgwick's VI Corps of about 23,000 men marched out on the Orange Plank Road with the objective of reaching his superior Maj. Gen. Joseph Hooker's force at Chancellorsville. He was delayed by Brig. Gen. Cadmus M. Wilcox's brigade of Maj. Gen. Jubal A. Early's force during the afternoon of May 3 before halting at Salem Church.
After receiving word of Sedgwick's breakthrough at Fredericksburg, Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee detached the division of Lafayette McLaws from the Chancellorsville lines and marched them to Salem Church. McLaws's division arrived at Wilcox's position around Salem Church shortly after noon, reinforced by William Mahone's brigade of Richard H. Anderson's division.
At first Sedgwick believed that he faced a single brigade of infantry, so about 3:30 p.m. he attacked the Confederate positions with only William T. H. Brooks division. Brooks succeeded in driving back McLaws's right flank but a counterattack stopped the Union attack and forced Brooks to retreat back to his original position; sunset ended the combat before any further units were involved. During the night, Lee ordered Early to attack Sedgwick's left flank in the morning, while McLaws attacked the Union right. Also during the night, Sedgwick received no further orders from Hooker other than authorization to retreat across the river if Sedgwick thought the move was necessary.
At 7 a.m. on May 4, Early recaptured Marye's Heights then turned west until he arrived at Sedgwick's main lines, halting after coming under heavy fire. During the remainder of the morning, Early launched a series of uncoordinated attacks on Sedgwick's position, all of which were defeated.
By 11 a.m. on May 4 General Sedgwick was facing three directions; west towards Lee's main body and the Salem Church, south towards Anderson's division, and East towards Early's division. When General Sedgwick heard rumors that reinforcements from Richmond had arrived he felt his situation was becoming more difficult. He already had a six mile long line held by 20,000 troops against now 25,000 Confederates with only a bridgehead to retreat upon in failure, with more Confederates possibly arriving and himself with over 5,000 casualties he was concerned. He reported his difficult situation to General Hooker and requested the main army assist him. General Hooker, however, replied not to attack unless the main army did the same. Meanwhile, General Lee arrived at McLaws' headquarters at 11 a.m. and McLaws informed him that he did not feel strong enough to launch an attack and asked for reinforcements. Anderson was ordered to bring the other three brigades of his division and position them between McLaws and Early; he then launched additional attacks, which were also defeated.
The American Civil War (1861–1865) was the deadliest conflict in American history, killing an estimated 620,000 to 750,000 soldiers and an unknown number of civilians. The Confederate States of America, formed by eleven seceding Southern states, faced the Union in four years of warfare across 23 states and territories. Major engagements included First and Second Bull Run, Antietam (the bloodiest single day in American history, September 17, 1862), Chancellorsville, Gettysburg (July 1–3, 1863), Vicksburg (surrendered July 4, 1863), and Sherman's March through Georgia and the Carolinas (1864–1865). President Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation on January 1, 1863, transforming the war's stated purpose to include the abolition of slavery and enabling the enlistment of approximately 180,000 Black men in the United States Colored Troops. Confederate General Robert E. Lee surrendered to Ulysses S. Grant at Appomattox Court House on April 9, 1865. The war resolved the question of secession and ended American slavery, though Reconstruction would face sustained resistance in its attempt to secure civil rights for formerly enslaved people.
This page covers Battle of Salem Church. A full Aubrey report for the area pulls together this battle alongside historic sites, land records, and everything else the record holds within a few miles:
Every location is different. Not every section appears for every place, only what the historical record actually holds turns up in a report.
Content adapted from Wikipedia under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License. Wikipedia source.
Aubrey generates in-depth historical research for any location in the US, drawing on NRHP records, battlefield archives, census history and geological data to tell the full story of a place.