John Dooley's Civil War: An Irish American's Journey in the First Virginia Infantry Regiment

3. “Resting from Our Labors”: Camp in the Shenandoah Valley, September–November 1862

Chapter 3 “Resting from Our Labors”: Camp in the Shenandoah Valley, September– November 1862 Antietam/Sharpsburg was, as Dooley maintained, a tactical success for Lee and, given the odds he faced, perhaps his greatest performance during the war. But if it was a tactical triumph for the Confederates, it proved to be a strategic one for the Federals. Union troops ultimately forced Lee to retreat to Virginia, ending any hope he had of administering a devastating defeat to Union forces on their own soil, which would have greatly increased the possibilities for a negotiated peace and Southern independence. Antietam decisively changed the character of the war by giving President Lincoln the opportunity to issue his Emancipation Proclamation , which implicitly changed the meaning of the conflict by making the abolition of slavery a war goal. Dooley no doubt was aware of this but chose to ignore it. George McClellan, basking in the grand triumph he felt he had achieved on September 17, was content to rest his huge army around Sharpsburg, particularly after the bloody repulse his cavalry suffered at the Potomac River from Lee’s rearguard. Despite Lincoln’s persistent prodding to pursue Lee into Virginia, the “Resting from Our Labors” 56 Army of the Potomac remained in place for the next six weeks. Thirty miles to the southwest, Lee, calculating that McClellan would remain characteristically inactive, made camp in the lower Shenandoah Valley to reorganize and rejuvenate his forces after the relentless campaigning of the past spring and summer. In his “War Diary” Dooley virtually skips over the more than two months that Longstreet’s Corps spent in camp, first near Winchester , then in the vicinity of Culpeper Court House. This chapter begins with the conclusion of the “Maryland Campaign”; most of it is taken from “Pickett’s Reminiscences.” Dooley addresses what he calls “the daily facts” of camp life and the journeys between: the vermin, which constant scourge camp provides the leisure to seek ways to contain, if not conquer; the restoration, through reorganization, drill, reviews, and the routinization of discipline, of an army badly spent from the campaigns of the past spring and summer; the ubiquitous camp humor; the nightly revivals and songfests that attract farm boys and the urban bred respectively; and the elements, which force the soldiers to cope the best they can. In the Valley camp Willie Mitchel joins Dooley’s company and quickly becomes his closest friend as they join together in fulfilling Willie’s passion for insect classification. When they change campsites from Winchester to Culpeper, the trek up the Valley and across the Blue Ridge Mountains allows Dooley’s descriptive talents full play as he revisits the sublime scenery he first experienced as a thirteen-year-old, now marred in too many places by the devastating imprint of war that the armies, mostly Federal, have left upon the land. As they head south after breaking camp at Culpeper, the sound of a locomotive is a soothing reminder of home, which place Dooley dares to dream that they may be making their way toward in order to settle down for the winter. The fighting, he soon discovers, has not yet ended for the year. [mc] We remained for several days near Martinsburg resting and watching the movements of the enemy. I visited Martinsburg which I found to be a thriving little place but nearly entirely of Northern sentiment . Several fine railroad bridges here have been destroyed and the people look with little favour upon the Confederate soldiers. I thought probably I might be acquainted with the priest of the town and called [. . .] to see him. He received me very kindly and hospitably said he knew my father and mother very well and made me feel quite at home; Fr. Camp in the Shenandoah Valley, September–November 1862 57 Becker (Now Bishop Becker)1 having to leave home on sick calls, bade me be at home and made me promise to stay for dinner; after strolling about the town for several hours I returned to his house and being furnished with letter paper wrote quite a descriptive account of the recent battle at Sharpsburg which Fr. Becker promised to have mailed for me to my home in Richmond. I said I felt at home; but I exaggerate. In fact I felt like a guilty wretch who was abusing the kindest hospitality in the most unwarrantable manner. For the whole time I...