Gods and Generals - Jeff Shaara [160]
They had not known what Burnside was going to do here, below the town. Lee thought he might cross lower, downstream, at Skinker’s Neck, and so he sent General Early there, commanding the division of the wounded Dick Ewell. Daniel Hill had been sent farther down, protecting the crossing at Port Royal, and Jackson’s own division, commanded now by William Taliaferro, set up close by at Guiney’s Station. Only A. P. Hill’s division was below Longstreet’s lines, around the place where Jackson sat, across from the new bridges.
As the fog lifted and the bridges grew, Burnside finally showed his hand. Now the instructions came from Lee: Jackson would bring the corps together. He had sent his staff out quickly, the call for his units to come together here, below Longstreet, forming a heavy line down through the trees. Below Fredericksburg the river curved away slightly, and the plain between the woods and the river was wider than in front of Longstreet. But it was open and flat and there would be nowhere to hide.
On his left, toward the base of Marye’s Heights, he linked up with Longstreet’s right, the division of John Bell Hood. It was slow going in the thick trees, but if the Federal crossing was not rapid, if they did not mass an attack today, there would be time.
The new uniform stayed behind, in his tent. Jackson had thought about it, felt the fine material again, rubbed his fingers gently over the new gold braid, but it was not time. He did not want to appear too . . . taken with it, with the grand appearance. He would wear it for the men, had seen how it inspired them, but not today; today they were working, their duty was clear, and so there was no need.
He sat stiffly on the small horse, stared through the glasses, focused past overhanging branches, bare and brittle, but behind him the trees were thick enough to hide his men. The ground rose up toward him, and he was high enough to see the white of the water and the thin lines of pontoons, the new bridges. He focused closer, scanned across the wide, flat ground, and it made him ache. It would have been so simple, such a good place to form strong lines, cover the river with thousands of muskets and cut them to pieces as they came across. But then he raised the glasses, looked to the far heights above the river, saw the vast cluster of black, more than a hundred long-range cannon, better guns, more accurate than the Confederate batteries, and he knew they would have to wait, sit back in the trees while the Federal Army crossed at will, unmolested.
It was getting late now, the light fading fast. He scanned the horizon far down to the right, downstream, saw balloons, wondered how much Burnside knew, how much he could see. The trees were thick along the river there, and any troop movement might be exaggerated, the numbers inflated by nervous observers. Small units had been left to guard the crossings downstream. They were ordered to keep moving, marching back and forth, showing themselves in the small openings in the trees. It had always worked with the Federal lookouts, who seemed anxious to embellish their reports of vast gray armies prowling the ground in front of them.
Jackson knew that today he had been vulnerable, too spread out, but it had to be—at worst, the divisions had been within a day’s march of each other, could delay the crossing at any point long enough for support to arrive. But then, gratefully, Burnside did not cross at all, sat still while Lee played the chess game, watched Burnside’s plan unfold, and now Jackson was moving everyone into place, and through the trees down to his right more men were filling the lines.
He saw movement, glassed toward the river, saw troops, blue dots appearing suddenly on his side of the river, climbing up, reaching the top of the steep embankment that lined the river there. He looked beyond, to the bridges, expected to see great masses of troops, but there was only a thin line now, men moving across in single file.