Includes pictures of the battles' important generals and locations.
Includes maps of the battles.
Includes accounts of the fighting written by important generals like Lee, Longstreet, Stonewall Jackson, and more.
Includes a Bibliography of each battle for further reading.
With the exception of George Washington, perhaps the most famous general in American history is Robert E. Lee (January 19, 1807 - October 12, 1870), despite the fact he led the Confederate Army of Northern Virginia against the Union in the Civil War. Lee is remembered today for constantly defeating the Union's Army of the Potomac in the Eastern theater from 1862-1865, considerably frustrating Lincoln and his generals. His leadership of his army led to him being deified after the war by some of his former subordinates, especially Virginians, and he came to personify the Lost Cause's ideal Southern soldier. His reputation was secured in the decades after the war as a general who brilliantly led his men to amazing victories against all odds.
Among those victories, the three most decisive and stunning victories were Second Manassas (August 1862), Fredericksburg (December 1862) and Chancellorsville (May 1863).
The Second Battle of Bull Run (August 28-30, 1862) was one of the most decisive battles fought during the Civil War, and it was also one of the most unlikely. Less than three months before the battle, Joseph E. Johnston's Army of Northern Virginia had been pushed back nearly all the way to Richmond by George B. McClellan's Army of the Potomac, so close that Union soldiers could see the church steeples of the Confederate capital. And yet, at the end of Second Manassas, Robert E. Lee's Army of Northern Virginia found itself in the field unopposed about 20 miles away from the Union capital of Washington D.C.
With Washington urging Army of the Potomac commander Ambrose Burnside to advance against Lee, Burnside launched an ill fated operation near Fredericksburg in December 1862. From December 12-13, Burnside struggled to get his army across the river while it was under fire from Confederates in Fredericksburg, and things only got worse when they did. The battle is mostly remembered for the piecemeal attacks the Union army made on heavily fortified positions Longstreet's men took up on Marye's Heights. As they threw themselves at Longstreet's heavily fortified position along the high ground, the Northern soldiers were mowed down again and again. During the battle, Lee turned to Longstreet and commented, "It is well that war is so terrible, otherwise we should grow too fond of it."
In early May 1863, the Army of the Potomac was at the height of its power as it bore down on Lee's Army of Northern Virginia near Fredericksburg. With an army nearing 130,000 men, Joe Hooker's Army of the Potomac was twice the size of the Army of Northern Virginia. Despite being outnumbered, Lee sized up his opponents and decided to divide his forces in the face of the enemy, sending Stonewall Jackson to turn the Union army's right flank while the rest of the army maintained positions near Fredericksburg. The Battle of Chancellorsville is one of the most famous of the Civil War, and the most famous part of the battle was Stonewall Jackson's daring march across the Army of the Potomac's flank, surprising the XI Corps with an attack on May 2, 1863.
Having seized the initiative, half of Lee's army launched desperate attacks on Hooker's forces near the Wilderness over the next 2 days, while simultaneously defending against Union attacks around Fredericksburg that pushed the other half of his army back several miles on May 3. Lee's heavily outnumbered army had just won the most stunning victory of the war.
Robert E. Lee's Greatest Victories analyzes all three of the battles, including the campaigns that led up to them and the way they affected the Civil War at the time and in the future. You'll learn about the 3 battles l