Battle of Harpers Ferry
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The Battle of Harpers Ferry was fought September 12–15, 1862, as part of the Maryland Campaign of the American Civil War. A Confederate force commanded by Thomas J. "Stonewall" Jackson captured the Union garrison at Harpers Ferry, Virginia (now West Virginia) with its 12,419 soldiers.
Harpers Ferry was earlier the site of the abolitionist John Brown's attack on the Federal arsenal there. It is a small town at the confluence of the Potomac River and the Shenandoah River. It was virtually indefensible, dominated on all sides by higher ground.
After Robert E. Lee's army had advanced into Maryland, Lee learned that the Union garrison, led by Colonel Dixon S. Miles, had not retreated. Lee planned to capture the Union garrison and the Federal arsenal, with its supplies of rifles and ammunition. He sent three columns of troops to converge and attack from three directions. The largest column, under Jackson, was to recross the Potomac and circle around to the west of Harpers Ferry and attack it from that direction, while the other two columns, under Generals Lafayette McLaws and John G. Walker, were to capture Maryland Heights and Loudon Heights, commanding the town from the east and south.
George B. McClellan, the Union commander of the Army of the Potomac, in pursuit of Lee, had wanted to add the Harpers Ferry garrison to his field army, but general-in-chief Henry W. Halleck had refused, saying that the movement would be too difficult and that Miles had to defend himself until McClellan could relieve him. Halleck had probably expected Miles to show some military knowledge and courage. Instead, although reinforced by the Federal garrison from Martinsburg, which had eluded Jackson (Jackson's attempt to capture it was responsible for most of his delay in reaching Harpers Ferry), Miles insisted on keeping most of the troops near the town instead of taking up a commanding position on Maryland Heights. Once the detachment of 1,600 men he had left on the Heights was driven back, he was hopelessly trapped by Confederates on higher ground on all sides.
During the night of September 14, Colonel Benjamin F. Davis and Colonel Amos Voss led their 1,200 cavalrymen out of Harpers Ferry, evading McLaws, and capturing Longstreet's ammunition train along the way. Miles made no effort to follow them with the rest of the garrison. He had not been informed of a relief force sent by McClellan under William B. Franklin, so presumably felt his position was hopeless. Besides, most of Miles' troops were new and inexperienced and could not fight their way successfully through enemy lines. The next morning, September 15, the Confederates bombarded the garrison from all sides and it was forced to surrender. Miles himself was mortally wounded in the bombardment.
At noon on September 15, a courier reached Jackson with word from Lee: Get your troops to Sharpsburg as quickly as possible. Jackson left A.P. Hill at Harpers Ferry to manage the parole of federal prisoners and began marching to join the Battle of Antietam.
References
- National Parks Service page on the battle (http://www2.cr.nps.gov/abpp/battles/wv010.htm)
External links
- West Point Atlas map of the capture of Harpers Ferry (http://www.dean.usma.edu/history/web03/atlases/american%20civil%20war/acw%20pages/harpers_ferry.htm)