White Oak Swamp

On June 30, 1862, fighting broke out at White Oak Swamp in Henrico County, Virginia, one of the engagements in the Seven Days Battles during the Peninsula Campaign of the American Civil War. The Army of the Potomac was pulling back southeast toward the James River, and its rearguard, commanded by Maj. Gen. William B. Franklin, held off the divisions of Maj. Gen. Thomas J. "Stonewall" Jackson at the crossing of White Oak Bridge, a clash that amounted to an artillery duel. Two miles (3 km) to the south, the larger Battle of Glendale was unfolding near Frayser's Farm, and most historians treat the fighting at White Oak Swamp as a component of that broader Glendale action rather than a separate battle. Franklin's VI Corps, under Brig. Gen. William B. Franklin, managed to block Jackson from reaching Glendale in time to take part in the combined attack on Union forces that Lee had ordered. The day ended without a clear victor, though the Union Army escaped destruction and went on to establish a formidable defensive line at Malvern Hill.

Battle

Colonel Stapleton Crutchfield, chief of artillery, led the column as Jackson's troops headed south along the White Oak Road. The pace was slow, since thousands of wounded Union prisoners traveled with them, along with much of the plunder they had gathered at Savage's Station. Upon reaching the swamp, they discovered that its only bridge had already been destroyed by fire two hours before. Jackson himself did not arrive until noon, at which point he signed off on Crutchfield's plan for positioning the guns along a ridge so they could fire at an angle across the swamp toward the Union infantry and artillery visible roughly 300 yards (270 m) off. When 2 p.m. came on June 30, thirty one Confederate guns across seven batteries erupted in fire, taking the Union side off guard and knocking out a number of their cannons.

Jackson then instructed his engineers to start rebuilding the destroyed span, while sending Colonel Thomas T. Munford's 2nd Virginia Cavalry into the swamp itself to seize whatever Union artillery pieces had been left behind in the chaos of the shelling. As horses and soldiers struggled through debris choked water reaching up to their bellies, Jackson crossed alongside Major General D.H. Hill to scout the ground personally. A shell from a Union gun burst just a few feet from where the two officers sat on horseback, yet somehow neither man was hurt. From this vantage, Jackson could tell that Federal infantry and artillery were strengthening their position, and that sharpshooters positioned nearby would make life miserable for his engineers working on the bridge. It became clear to him that forcing a crossing there simply would not work.

According to Munford's findings, a crossing point called Fisher's Ford lay about a quarter mile downstream and could serve the infantry well. Meanwhile Brigadier General Wade Hampton located an even nearer spot where a makeshift bridge might be thrown together for foot soldiers. Though Jackson told him to proceed with building it, he himself made no further move to get his men across, concluding that any attack was pointless without the ability to bring his artillery over as well. Even as the exchange of cannon fire across the swamp grew to involve more than 40 guns, and even with fighting raging at Glendale barely 3 miles (4.8 km) off, Jackson settled beneath a wide oak tree and drifted into sleep for more than an hour.

Aftermath

Because Jackson failed to act, Franklin was able to pull some units from his corps late in the day and send them to bolster Union forces at Glendale. Jackson never told Lee what was happening on his front, and Lee waited too long before dispatching someone to locate him, by which point nothing could be salvaged. Tens of thousands of soldiers belonged to Jackson's wing and Franklin's corps combined, yet the fighting at White Oak Swamp never escalated into infantry combat, remaining essentially an artillery exchange. Confederate losses came to three artillerymen dead and twelve wounded. Union casualties were never precisely tallied, though historian Brian K. Burton places the figure at roughly 100, noting that the 5th New Hampshire suffered worst of all with 5 killed and 9 wounded.

That evening, after eating with his staff, Jackson drifted off to sleep once more, a biscuit still clamped between his teeth. When he woke, he declared that they should all go to bed at once and rise at dawn to see what could be accomplished the following day. It took two weeks before he gave any account of his sluggish behavior during the fighting, remarking simply that Lee could have summoned him if he had been needed. For his part, Lee offered no reproach of Jackson regarding the engagement.

Edward Porter Alexander, a leading Confederate artillery officer who later wrote about the war, mourned the missed chance at Glendale and White Oak Swamp, writing that considering the opportunities within Lee's reach that summer afternoon was almost too painful to bear, given that Stonewall Jackson had let them slip away.