Page:Southern Historical Society Papers volume 03.djvu/244

and upon the approach of the enemy, Lieutenant-Colonel J. T. Brown, whose artillery was passing at the time, placed a battery in position to aid in checking his advance. A small number of men who were marching to join their commands, including Captain Moore, with his two companies of the Fourteenth Tennessee regiment of Archer's brigade, reported to Colonel Brown, and supported his guns. The enemy was kept back by this small force until the train had passed, but his superior numbers enabled him subsequently to surround and capture the greater part of the Twenty-third Georgia regiment. General Anderson was directed to send a brigade to resist the further progress of this column, and detached General Posey for that purpsse. General Posey became warmly engaged with a superior force, but being reinforced by General Wright, the enemy's advance was arrested. After a long and fatiguing march, General Jackson's leading division, under General Rodes, reached the old turnpike, about three miles in rear of Chancellorsville, at four P. M. As the different divisions arrived they were formed at right angles to the road—Rodes in front, Trimble's division, under Brigadier-General Colston, in the second, and A. P. Hill's in the third line. At six P. M. the advance was ordered. The enemy were taken by surprise and fled after a brief resistance. General Rodes' men pushed forward with great vigor and enthusiasm, followed closely by the second and third lines. Position after position was carried, the guns captured, and every effort of the enemy to rally defeated by the impetuous rush of our troops. In the ardor of pursuit through the thick and tangled woods, the first and second lines at last became mingled and moved on together as one. The enemy made a stand at a line of breastworks across the road at the house of Melzi Chancellor, but the troops of Rodes and Colston dashed over the entrenchments together, and the fight and pursuit were resumed and continued until our advance was arrested by the abatis in front of the line of works near the central position at. Chancellorsville. It was now dark, and General Jackson ordered the third line, under General Hill, to advance to the front and relieve the troops of Rodes and Colston, who were completely blended, and in such disorder, from their advance through intricate woods and over broken ground, that it was necessary to reform them. As Hill's men moved forward, General Jackson, with his staff and escort, returning from the extreme front, met his skirmishers advancing, and, in the obscurity of the night, were mistaken for the enemy, and fired upon. Captain Boswell,