While talking to the Great God of Battles, how could he hear what a poor cavalryman was saying. "Tell General Rodes," said he, suddenly whirling his horse towards the courier, "to move across the Old plank-road; halt when he gets to the Old turnpike, and I will join him there." One more look upon the Federal lines, and then he rode rapidly down the hill, his arms flapping to the motion of his horse, over whose head it seemed, good rider as he was, he would certainly go. I expected to be told I had made a valuable personal reconnoissance—saving the lives of many soldiers, and that Jackson was indebted to me to that amount at least. Perhaps I might have been a little chagrined at Jackson's silence, and hence commented inwardly and adversely upon his horsemanship. Alas! I had looked upon him for the last time.
While Jackson's column was moving to the Old turnpike, my cavalry, supported by the Stonewall brigade under Paxton, moved a short distance down the Plank road to mask the movement.
Rodes' division—Jackson's advance—reached the Old turnpike about three miles in rear of Chancellorsville, at 4 P. M. (General Lee's report). "As the different divisions arrived they were formed at right angles to the road"—Rodes in front; Trimble's division, under Colston, in the second, line, two hundred yards in rear of Rodes, and A. P. Hill's division in the third line.
At 6 P. M., all being ready, Jackson ordered the advance. Howard, commanding Hooker's right, was at that moment at Dowdall's or Melzei Chancellor's, his headquarters. Carl Schurz was with him. Howard's right division was commanded by General Charles Devens. He reported the enemy's cavalry, with horse artillery, deployed in his front at 4 P. M.
Jackson's men burst with a cheer upon the startled enemy, and swept down in rear of Howard's line, capturing cannon before they could be turned upon them. Howard reports as the only fighting that parts of Schimmelfennig's and Krzyzancerski's brigades moved gradually back, keeping up a fire, and that "at the centre and near the Plank road there was a blind panic and a great confusion." Devens, the present Attorney-General, fell back rapidly, very rapidly, upon Schurz, the present Secretary of the Interior, commanding the next division, and Hooker's right flank was yielded up by Howard. Sickles, while trying to cut off Jackson, came near being cut off himself. Pleasanton, who was with him, says he sent back the Eighth Pennsylvania cavalry, and hurled it at Jackson's corps, with heavy loss to them, but he gained fifteen
