Battle Of Chancellorsville Essay

The battle of Chancellorsville was a major battle that occurred from 27 April to 6 May 1863. The Union Army under the command of Major General Joseph “Fighting Joe" Hooker attacked the Confederate Army under the command of General Robert E. Lee near the town of Chancellorsville, Virginia. Major General Hooker, commanded approximately 130,000 men. General Lee was in command of the Confederate Army of approximately 60,000 men. The Confederate Army ultimately forced the Union Army to withdraw from the Chancellorsville region despite having less than half men. There are several reasons why the Confederates were able to win at Chancellorsville. The factor that contributed the most to the Union defeat is General Hooker’s failure to execute mission

Major General Hooker’s plan goes well until 1 May 1863. Major General Hooker is able to successfully move his forces covertly across the Rapidan and Rappahannock rivers to the vicinity of Chancellorsville undetected for the most part. Union forces have the element of surprise, dominate numbers, and all key terrain until 1 May 1863. On 1 May 1863 Major General Hooker decides to change his plan. Instead of attacking the enemy forces, he decides that he will assume a consolidated defensive posture and see what General Lee does. He is reliant on General Stoneman who is in command of his cavalry corps to cut General Lee’s supply lines. This does not happen. General Stoneman received conflicting guidance. Stoneman received a myriad of missions relating to harassing the enemy. The primary one that Major General Hooker was counting on was that Stoneman would be successful in cutting confederate supply lines. The guidance he gave to Stoneman via a very long and eloquent letter ended with “Let your watchword be fight, fight, fight, bearing in mind that time is valuable to your General as it is to the Rebels.” Stoneman attempted to follow this guidance by attacking small enemy positions but did not complete his primary mission of cutting supply lines. In addition to General Stoneman’s failure, Major General Hooker’s change in plans from an offensive envelopment to a defense created confusion among the Union Corps Commanders. Major General Hooker fails to describe his new visualization to his subordinate commanders. Hooker does not communicate the new plan to any of his corps commanders except Generals Stoneman, and Sedgewick. He issued vague guidance to them. An example of this is his communication to Union Army. Major General Sedgewick. He is instructed to “Attack the enemy if an opportunity presents itself with a reasonable expectation of success.” Sedgewick would take no