Fredericksburg, Chancellorsville and Lee’s strategy to invade Pennsylvania

March, 1862: McClellan fails in the Peninsular Campaign August, 1862: McClellan refuses to put all of his men in the fight and loses again at Second Battle of Bull Run. September, 1862: Lee invades the North for the first time and the outcome of the ensuing battle, Antietam, is a draw. Yet the Confederates retreat south. President Lincoln takes this opportunity to issue the Emancipation Proclamation which effectively ends the possibility of European nations (Great Britain, France) recognizing the Confederacy. November, 1862: Lincoln, growing impatient with McClellan replaces him with Ambrose E. Burnside. December, 1862: Burnside suffers a horrible defeat to the smaller Confederate army under Lee at Fredericksburg, losing nearly 13,000 men (14 frontal assaults up the hill at Mary’s Heights. *U.S. Grant is outfighting the Confederates out West.

Hooker outmaneuvers Lee and actually has the advantage. He leaves Sedgwick with 2/5ths of his army at Fredericksburg to feign an attack then moves the rest up the Rappahannock River to cross and have Lee stuck in the middle. Lee orders General Stonewall Jackson to take 28,000 men on a flanking maneuver around to Hooker’s right flank, pushing the Federals back two miles. Planning a night attack, Jackson rode ahead. As he was returning to the lines he was shot by an advanced Confederate pickets. His arm is amputated and he later dies from his wounds. By May 6 th, Hooker gives up the fight and returns back across the river.

After the mistakes at Chancellorsville, Joseph Hooker offers his resignation to Lincoln, who accepts and places George Meade as Commander in Chief of the Army of the Potomac. The fifth different Union general of the Army of the Potomac. The Confederate cabinet and leading generals met to discuss strategy after the Battle of Chancellorsville. General James Longstreet believed that troops should be sent west to retake captured territory and force Grant to release his grip on Vicksburg. Lee rejected this plan (and since he was by then viewed as an unbeatable Confederate war hero, the group agreed with him). Instead, the Confederates should invade Pennsylvania. This would: 1.Relieve the threat on Richmond 2.Enable the army to supply itself from the rich Pennsylvania countryside 3.Reduce the pressure on Confederate armies out west 4.Strengthen Peace Democrats in the North 5.Reopen negotiations with European nations to recognize the Confederacy 6.Perhaps even capture Washington DC None of this happens. At the first major battle of the invasion campaign the Confederates suffer a clear defeat, the first in the Eastern Theater of the war (at Gettysburg) and retreat back to Virginia.