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Memorializing Jackson's Death
The Battle of Chancellorsville
"Of his soldiers he was the idol;
of his country he was the hope;
of war he was the master."
-- Senator John Warwick Daniel
When General "Stonewall" Jackson died eight days after being wounded in these woods, shock waves rippled through the South. Confederates immediately memorialized him in in words. "A greater sense of loss and deeper grief never followed the death of mortal man," wrote one artilleryman. Few felt Jackson's loss more keenly than Robert E. Lee, who confessed "I know not how to replace him."
After the war local residents erected a small boulder about 60 yards from the site, to commemorate the general's wounding. That rock still stands amid the bushes to your left-front. In 1888, 5,000 people attended the dedication of the more formal monument in front of you. |