December 1862 – The Battle of Fredericksburg
At this time the Confederacy held the city of Fredericksburg, Virginia. The main areas of defense were along Willis Hill, and Marye’s Hill, using a small family cemetery. One of the units stationed in Fredericksburg at the time was an elite unit of troops from Louisiana known as “The Washington Artillery”, led by Confederate Captain Charles W. Squires.
Captain Squires and his unit made strategic use of the small cemetery, hiding cannons in nearby gun pits, his soldiers used the thick brick walls of the cemetery to hide their ammunition and horses from the view and assault of Union Troops. He also commandeered houses in the area to use as makeshift medical hospitals. The area was high up, giving the Confederates a distinct advantage over the town and battlefield below them.
On December 13, 1862, the Union Army arrived under the command of Ambrose E. Burnside. He held a relentless assault towards Marye’s Heights all day. This battle is believed to be both the first instance of urban combat, and the first opposed river crossing.
“Amidst shrieking shells and singing rifle-balls” that the area around the Willis Cemetery was a “frightful scene to traverse, –every inch of ground continually struck, apparently by bullets or fragments of shells. . . .It looked like certain death, or ghastly wounds” to expose oneself outside of the gunpits. The whitewashed brick dwelling immediately beside Captain Squires’ pits had been hit so many times by shells and bullets, that the facade had changed from white to brick-dust red by afternoon”.-A quote from an unnamed Confederate soldier recalling the event, National Park Service Records
Another statement explains the understanding anxiety of a Confederate soldier being ‘overwhelmed by “the noise, confusion, and excitement” of the battlefield around him. General Joseph B. Kershaw and his South Carolina brigade assisted by settling and defending on the backside of Willis Hill.
Sometime late in the battle, Lieutenant Colonel E. Porter Alexander brought much-needed reinforcements to the field, giving the other soldiers a needed break.Along the summit of Willis and Marye’s hills, the South Carolina brigade was exposed to the Union army, whose relentless attacks gave them “one of the highest shelling’s the troops ever experienced” and was where they suffered the most losses.Union troops advanced the hill fourteen times that day, each time receiving devastating blows and being beaten back. By nightfall, seven thousand Union soldiers were dying or dead on the battlefield. The Confederates were injured and losses were estimated at one thousand and two hundred.
December 14th
Sgt. Richard Rawland Kirkland requested and was granted permission by General Kershaw to tend to the wounded soldiers on the other side of the wall. He gathered as many full canteens as he could, and went over the brick wall onto the field below.Sgt. Kirkland administered aid to the wounded and dying Union soldiers, and at the surprise of Kershaw, was not fired upon by the Union Troops. He later made the following account.
“Unharmed he reached the nearest sufferer. He knelt beside him, tenderly raised the drooping head, rested it gently upon his own noble breast, and poured the precious life-giving fluid down the fever-scorched throat. This done, he laid him tenderly down, placed his knapsack under his head, straightened out his broken limb, spread his overcoat over him, replaced his empty canteen with a full one, and turned to another sufferer.”-Account by Gen. Kershaw, National Park Service Records
Sgt. Kirkland’s compassion and kindness likely saved lives, allowing injured troops to survive long enough for aid to reach them, and comforted many in their last moments. His heroic efforts earned him the nickname the 'Angel of Marye's Heights' from both Union and Confederate soldiers. Sadly, only a year later he would be killed in the battle of Chickamauga. A monument was erected in 1965 dedicated to Sgt. Kirkland and his compassion for the men on the battlefield. Sometime during or after the Battle of Fredericksburg, an unknown individual or group of individuals took it upon themselves to bury a body in the graveyard, instead of a traditional mass grave. A small stone bears the information “_ Coffee, Co. E, 24th Georgia”. This will be looked into in the next chapter.
The Battle of Fredericksburg II
In the Spring of 1863 Union General Joseph Hooker, having just been bested by Robert E. Lee at Chancellorsville, was determined to gain Fredericksburg. Another Union general, John Sedgwick recommended attacking the same area that had decimated Burnside’s army months before.The battalions met again with massive artillery, and the Union soldiers returned as much fire as possible, resulting in extreme damage to the Willis Cemetery, including collapsing parts of the walls. The cemetery physically shows the damage the battles had on it, still displaying much of the original stonework damaged during the fighting.
Union soldiers of the 6th Maine Volunteers managed to finally break areas in the Confederate lines, leading troops into hand-to-hand combat, surrounding the Washington Artillery, and taking the area for the Union.Fredericksburg was extensively damaged, leaving many places in absolute ruin. Union soldiers also looted the remains of the city.Writer Louisa May Alcott was a war nurse for the Union Army and served at the Battle of Fredericksburg. She wrote about the experience in her book ‘Hospital Sketches’ published in 1863.
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