Existing comment:
A Missed Opportunity
The morning of May 3rd found the Confederate army heavily outnumbered and dangerously divided. "Stonewall" Jackson's flank attack the evening before had staggered the Union army but had not irretrievably damaged it. As the day broke, Jackson's corps, now under J.E.B. Stuart, lay one-half mile to your left; the rest of the army, personally led by Lee, was one mile to your right. Between them lay this large, open plateau known as Hazel Grove.
Hazel Grove was the key to the battlefield. Had Hooker strongly defended the plateau, he could have kept the Confederate army divided and defeated it one piece at a time. But the Union leader had lost the will to fight. Before dawn he ordered his troops to evacuate Hazel Grove and fall back toward Chancellorsville, forfeiting what was perhaps his best chance for victory.
"...The battle was still Hooker's, had he fought where he stood. But about dawn he made the fatal mistake of [evacuating Hazel Grove.] There has rarely been a more gratuitous gift of a battle-field."
-- Col. E. Porter Alexander, CSA |