Rebels at the Gate: Lee and McClellan on the Front Line of a Nation Divided (32 page)

In hindsight, Union General Cox marveled at Wise's talent for keeping a command in hot water. “If he had been half as troublesome to me as he was to Floyd,” Cox wrote, “I should, indeed, have had a hot time of it. But he did me royal service by preventing anything approaching unity of action between the principal Confederate columns.”
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Before Floyd could address Wise's latest act of insubordination, Rosecrans struck him on the afternoon of September 10 at Carnifex Ferry. The action began as a reconnaissance, but newly minted Brigadier General Henry Benham (the eager engineer who had chased down General Garnett) led Federal troops straight into the teeth of Floyd's defenses. The afternoon reconnaissance turned into a bloody assault.

Floyd's defenses were strong, hidden in dense forest with unscalable cliffs on the flanks, but his back was to the Gauley River in a deep canyon below, crossable only at the tenuous Carnifex Ferry. Although outnumbered nearly three to one, his eighteen hundred Confederates put up a spirited defense. They drove back successive Federal thrusts until darkness overtook the battlefield.
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By daybreak, Floyd's little Army of the Kanawha had vanished across the Gauley, sinking a footbridge and the ferryboats, leaving Rosecrans mystified but holding the field. Floyd claimed victory nonetheless. He had been shot in the right forearm, however. It
was a minor wound with major consequences—Floyd could no longer hold a pen in his war of words with General Wise.

Later that day, Wise found his antagonist prostrate on the roadside east of Hawks Nest. Floyd's wound had left him stunned and bewildered. Wise demanded orders. A dazed Floyd replied that “he did not know what orders to give.” Jumping at the opportunity, Wise fired off a scathing letter to General Lee. “Disasters have come, and disasters are coming,” he warned, “which you alone, I fear, can repair and prevent…. I solemnly protest that my force is not safe under [Floyd's] command, and I ask to be allowed to cooperate with some other superior.”
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On September 13, the warring generals retreated seventeen miles east on the James River and Kanawha Turnpike to Big Sewell Mountain. As usual, they camped more than a mile apart. Three days later, Floyd amicably sought Wise's council. The Yankees were reportedly approaching in two columns; General Cox from the west on the James River and Kanawha pike, and Rosecrans from the north as he shuttled troops across the river at Carnifex Ferry. General Wise argued that Floyd's camp on Big Sewell Mountain was “indefensible,” and urged that his own formidable post, one and one half miles east, should be occupied by the entire army. Wise proposed a counteroffensive. Floyd reportedly “liked the idea” and agreed to examine Wise's position the next morning. At that, General Wise returned to camp, satisfied that he had won the day.

But Wise had barely reached headquarters when General Floyd's wagon train began rolling through his camp—the Army of the Kanawha was in retreat! A dispatch from Floyd announced that he was falling back. Wise was instructed to hold himself in readiness to “bring up the rear.” This was too much for the hotheaded Wise. Incensed at Floyd's deception, he snapped at the messenger, “Tell General Floyd I will do no such thing; I propose to stay here and fight until doomsday.”
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As Floyd's little army filed past, a red-faced General Wise rode among his own troops. Still burning over Floyd's criticism of his Kanawha retreat, he rose in the stirrups and called out in a stentorian
voice, “Who is retreating now? Who is retreating now?” Wise repeated the query to another group of soldiers. Presently his entire command had assembled. Wise cried out again, “Men, who is retreating now? John B. Floyd, G__d___ him, the bullet-hit son of a b____, he is retreating now.”

True to his word, General Wise did not budge. For nearly a week, he traded barbed missives over his failure to join Floyd at Meadow Bluff, some twelve miles east. “I have not yet been able to discover how you could bring up the rear of a moving column by remaining stationary after this column had passed,” scolded Floyd. “Disastrous consequences…may ensue from a divided force,” he cautioned Wise on September 19. “If you still have time…to join my force and make a stand against the enemy at this point, I hope you will see the necessity of doing so at once.”
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The Federals under General Cox reached Floyd's abandoned camp on Big Sewell Mountain the next day. Cox had orders to probe Wise's defenses, postponing a general assault until Rosecrans's troops crossed the Gauley River to join him. Wise and his 2,200-man legion faced the prospect of holding back at least 5,300 Federals, with more on the way. Isolated from Floyd by twelve miles of muddy turnpike, he was in danger of being cut to pieces. But Wise refused to retreat. Fittingly, he named his post “Camp Defiance.”
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On September 15, Floyd wrote to President Jefferson Davis, “The petty jealousy of General Wise; his utter ignorance of all military rule and discipline; the peculiar contrariness of his character and disposition, are beginning to produce rapidly a disorganization which will prove fatal to the interests of the army if not arrested at once.” The cantankerous Wise, he grumbled, “obeys no orders without cavil, and does not hesitate to disregard a positive and peremptory order, upon the most frivolous pretext.”

Loath to arrest Wise and demoralize the entire legion, Floyd urged the president to transfer his combative opponent. “It is impossible for me to conduct a campaign with General Wise attached to my command,” Floyd informed Davis. “His presence
with my force is almost as injurious as if he were in the camp of the enemy with his whole command.”
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By now, the quarrel between Generals Wise and Floyd had become a public scandal. From Lewisburg, a member of the Richmond legislature warned President Davis of the dangers brought on by their feud. “They are inimical to each other as men can be,” he wrote on September 19, “and from their course and actions I am fully satisfied that each of them would be highly gratified to see the other annihilated…. It would be just as easy to combine oil and water as to expect a union of action between these gentlemen.”
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Into this hornet's nest of controversy rode the genteel Lee. As he drew rein at Floyd's Meadow Bluff headquarters on September 21, Lee's role as a “facilitator” was to be sorely tested. He was horrified to find Wise and Floyd separated in the face of the enemy. Lee fired off a dispatch to Wise, pleading for cooperation. “I know nothing of the relative advantages of the points occupied by yourself and General Floyd,” he wrote, “but as far as I can judge our united forces are not more than one-half of the strength of the enemy. Together they may not be able to stand his assault. It would be the height of imprudence to submit them separately to his attack…. I beg therefore, if not too late, that the troops be united, and that we conquer or die together.”
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That letter angered Wise. His reply must have stunned Lee. “I consider my force united with that of General Floyd as much as it ever has been,” Wise retorted. “The two positions had perhaps better be examined, I respectfully submit, before my judgment is condemned.…Just say, then, where we are to unite and ‘conquer or die together'…no man consults more the interest of the cause, according to his best ability and means, than I do.…Any imputation upon my motives or intentions in that respect by my superior would make me, perhaps, no longer a military subordinate of any man who breathes.”
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With disaster looming, Lee rode forward on September 22 to examine Big Sewell Mountain. He found the rebellious Wise
ensconced on the crest of the mountain at “Camp Defiance.” It was a very strong natural position—much stronger, in fact, than Floyd's post at Meadow Bluff. From Camp Defiance, Federal troops could be seen on the heights a little more than one mile west. Between the two armies stood a deep gorge, passable only by the James River and Kanawha Turnpike, which led directly through Wise's camp.

If the Federals launched a frontal assault, General Wise's position was superior to that of Floyd. But there was a threat of attack from the flanks. Rough traces led around Sewell Mountain from the north and south. Union General Rosecrans had already pulled a flank march at Rich Mountain; if he worked that strategy again, General Floyd was best positioned. But no flank movement had been detected. Lee returned to Meadow Bluff without ordering Wise to follow.
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General Wise came under heavy fire the next morning. The enemy appeared to be massing on Big Sewell in force. “I am compelled to stand here and fight as long as I can endure,” Wise told Lee. “All is at stake with my command, and it shall be sold dearly.”

Lee was in a quandary. The demonstration against Wise might be a feint—designed to hold the defiant general in place while Federal troops moved by side roads to surprise Floyd at Meadow Bluff. If Wise was flanked, both commands could be destroyed. Lee did not know whether General Rosecrans had linked up with Cox—the reports from Wise were contradictory. “If you cannot resist [the enemy],” Lee urged his recalcitrant general, “and are able to withdraw your command, you had best do so.”
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Wise would not retreat. “I tell you emphatically, sir, that the enemy are advancing in strong force on this turnpike,” he wrote on the morning of September 24. Lee wearily asked if Wise had sufficient ammunition. If the Confederate forces must remain divided, thought Lee, they could at least be equalized. Taking four of General Floyd's regiments, he rushed to the aid of Wise.
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Understandably, Lee arrived at Sewell Mountain in an ill humor. He found Wise's command in wretched condition—the officers
nearly as bitter toward Floyd as their general was. Clad in a wide-brimmed black hat, Lee stood by a campfire in the rain, hands clasped behind his back as though in deep thought. A young lieutenant approached, inquiring about ammunition. Lee eyed the intruder with a steely glare. “I think it very strange, Lieutenant,” he snapped, “that an officer of this command, which has been here a week, should come to me, who am just arrived, to ask who his ordnance officer is and where to find his ammunition. This is in keeping with everything else I find here—no order, no organization; nobody knows where anything is, no one understands his duty; officers and men alike are equally ignorant. This will not do.”
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Lee's headquarters wagon had not come up; he bivouacked in the rain, sheltered only by an overcoat. Dawn of September 25 found him reconnoitering the Federal lines with his glass. It now appeared that the entire army of General Rosecrans was before him. There was no movement on the flanks. He reported these developments to General Floyd by dispatch. “I suppose if we fall back the enemy will follow,” wrote Lee. “This is a strong point, if they will fight us here. The advantage is, they can get no position for their artillery, and their men I think will not advance without it. If they do not turn it, how would it do to make a stand here?”
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The risk in Lee's proposal was as much political as it was military. His suggestion that Floyd return to Sewell Mountain could be viewed as approval of Wise's insubordination. Floyd would regard it as a distinct rebuff. The two ex-governors might refuse to fight side by side. The war was young, the politicians powerful, and Lee unsure. He had been sent to these mountains for diplomacy. How would Floyd respond? A campaign hung in the balance.
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Lee's thoughts were interrupted by gunfire on the skirmish lines. General Wise spurred his mount into the action. Bullets sizzled through the trees as a blue-clad line drove Confederate skirmishers into Camp Defiance. Things began to look serious as Wise galloped back to a young artillery officer and ordered him to open fire. The cannoneer protested; a dense forest hid the enemy—his guns could “do no execution.”

“D__n the execution, sir,” Wise bellowed. “It's the
noise
that we want.”
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Even as Wise gallantly held the Yankees at bay, the answer to Lee's burning question arrived. It came in a dispatch, not from General Floyd, but from Richmond. Inside were orders to General Wise:

SIR: You are instructed to turn over all the troops heretofore immediately under your command to General Floyd, and report yourself in person to the Adjutant-General in this city with the least delay…By order of the President.
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Wise was mortified. Surely President Davis had not meant to order him away just as the fateful battle loomed? The order was humiliating! Wise wanted to ignore it until after the impending fight. “Dare I do so?” he asked Lee. “On the other hand, can I, in honor, leave you at this moment, though the disobedience of the order may subject me to the severest penalties?” Wise had defied General Floyd; he had defied Lee—would he now defy the President himself?

Lee urged Wise to obey. If he had not advised the president's action, he quietly concurred. The good of the service required that one of those rival generals be removed. Wise drafted a farewell to his beloved legion. “[P]rompt obedience is the first duty of military service,” he told them, with no little irony.
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