I have recently started reading Rebels at the Gate by W. Hunter Lesser. I knew very little of the WV campaign and wanted to dig into it a little more. So I have a question about Rich Mountain. So the plan is Rosecrans takes his part of the force, makes a flank march and attack. The sound of his attack would prompt McClellan to hit the Confederates from the other direction. They agree it should take 2 hours, it takes over 10 to make the march.
Rosecrans attacks once in position, McClellan can hear the sounds of it, but he refuses to do his attack.
I love to bag on Little Mac as much as the next guy, but can anyone help me more fully understand why McClellan backed out of the plan as it was being executed?
Rosecrans in fact attack twice, and his first attack failed. The int supplied had no rearward position, and McClellan thought Rosecrans was going to come in on the right flank of Camp Garnett, rather than engage the enemy at the Hart House. The order of events at the Hart House (from
here) is:
Phase 1 (2.30-3.30 p.m.): Skirmishers make contact and withdraw. Rosecrans takes about 45 minutes after coming forward to get 3 regiments into line below the crest of the hill and out of sight.
Phase 2 (3.30-3.50 p.m.): Rosecrans advances 3 regiments in line to the crest and initiates a firefight. It's one sided, and the rebel 6 pdr smashes the Federal lines. After 20 minutes all the Federals have fled back behind the crest of the hill and disengaged. The rebels cheer and believe they have defeated the Federals (it is this cheering McClellan and Beatty hear, as will be discussed).
Phase 3 (3.50-4.50 p.m.): Rosecrans tries to reorganise his troops to charge in column. Details are made to put a heavy fire on the 6 pdr, which is the lynchpin of the rebel defence.
Phase 4 (4.50-5.30): Skirmishers are sent forward to suppress the artillery piece, and after the crew is shot down and the caisson horses have bolted Rosecrans orders a charge. The Federals rush down the hill and the rebel commander orders a retreat down the road to Beverley. Bayonets are never crossed.
Pegram, at Camp Garnett, received a request for reinforcements at 4 p.m. All he felt he could spare was another 6 pdr and a coy (Company D (Powhatan Rifles), 20th Virginia) to escort it. As they were approaching the Hart House, around 5 p.m., Rosecrans finally charged and his left flank regiment (10th Indiana) encountered said gun and shot down the horses, who tipped it over as they fell.
Once Rosecrans overran the Hart House position at around 1730 he doesn't do as ordered and crest the hill, but rather becomes totally static and digs in a defensive position. He decided not to send a messenger to McClellan on the basis that his horses were too tired. The fact that Rosecrans' first attack was defeated had been detected in the Federal line at Roaring Creek.
Around 2.30 or 3 p.m. fire was heard from the rear of the mountain. To the newly Commissioned John Beatty it sounded
like a major battle. Beatty however had little idea what a battle sounded like at this stage, and indeed his writing shows he had a rather nervous disposition. McClellan was on the skirmish line listening to the engagement. He later described the firing as "distant and stationary, and there was no indication of Rosecrans's approach. Soon after the cessation of the distant firing..." McClellan was right and Beatty wrong.
McClellan listened to the firing for several hours, and he stood the 14th and 15th Indiana into line and was ready to assault Camp Garnett with 3 regiments (9th Ohio, 14th Indiana and 15th Indiana). Rosecrans never appeared behind the camp, and between 4.30 or 5.30 p.m the firing stopped. Whilst there with his staff Poe rode down to him and indicated that he could get a battery above and behind the enemy lines that evening. It was close to 5 p.m. and there was still no sign of Rosecrans and so McClellan assented. Poe had left the 8 coys of the 3rd Ohio occupying the spur where the battery was to be placed. The 4th Ohio came back down and the 4th and 9th Ohio cut a road through the vegetation and dragged 4 6 pdrs of the Michigan battery up the ridge that evening. The rebels, aware of what was happening, blasted away into the woods trying to stop the column but to no available. As the sun set, the 3rd Ohio and 4 guns were in position overlooking the rebel camp. They called this prominence "Sugar Hill". It was the threat of this battery, not Rosecrans, that compelled the rebels to retreat. Indeed, the retreating rebels walked right past Rosecrans unmolested.
At about 1800, Pegram decided to mount a night attack on Rosecrans. As darkness fell he marched 6 coys out of the camp over the hill, picked up the Powhatan Rifles to give him 7 coys, and tried to sneak up on the Hart House. However, there was a blue-on-blue musket discharge as they got into position and Pegram concluded the element of surprise was lost, and ordered the column (under Major Tyler) to escape. They marched straight past Rosecrans' position. Pegram returned to camp and eventually the remainder also try and escape, but got lost and surrendered to McClellan the next day at Beverley.
It was Rosecrans, not McClellan, who abandoned the plan when he decided not to advance west half a mile to the crest of the hill (which at the time would have him only encounter one scattered coy) and not to send a message to McClellan that he was in the rear.