Considered to be the definitive work on that subject. Lets market welcome james morgan. Mr. Morgan good morning, everyone. I will be moving around. We are good on sound back there . All, our topic, our theme really is a small battles and big results. Balls bluff meets those criteria. Very small battle. 1700 men on each side. The numbers were almost dead even. Tomakes it really amusing read the officers after action reports because on both sides they insist that they were terribly outnumbered by the other side. Numbers were dead even. At every point of contact during the day as the numbers are increasing up to the ultimate 1700, at every point of contact the numbers are fairly close. Small battle. Wasral Charles Stone who the Union Division commander after the war wrote to one of the first historian chroniclers of the war. He said balls bluff was like an unremarkable morning skirmish. That is what it was. If it had been bought fought in 1864, it may not even been named. In 1861. Ff was fought i will emphasize that several times. You have to understand the early war context of alls bluff. That makes it really stand out of balls bluff. That makes it really stand out. I do not have a powerpoint presentation. I like paper maps. This is to get you oriented. How many of you have been to balls bluff . Never mind the maps, you guys have all got it. This is just an area map. You can see washington dc in the corner. Alexandria to winchester turnpike is an important road because it went out into the shenandoah valley. Near thewn leesburg courthouse is the northsouth running route 15 called at the time the old carolina road. It ran from rochester, new york all the way to raleigh, north carolina. At the time that was the interstate. Andas an invasion route, extremely and extremely significant road. You can see on the map of the locations of forts that had been built to protect to the approaches to leesburg fort evans just north of route seven. It is owned and preserved by a rahau. Named protectingmmitted to conserving fort evans. It shows that they Preservation Community do not have to be at loggerheads with the corporations. For beauregard on the others to route seven no longer exist. There is a subdivision there. I believe it is called a bow regarding estates. It no longer exists. Those two are on very high ground. Any troops coming into leesburg from the east would have gone between a very nice artillery costs crossfire. Johnston, which is half there. It is on private property and they do not like you climbing around it. You have got that. A reminder about 15, 60 miles north of leesburg it runs through gettysburg. That same road is called the emmitsburg pike. Map of the the best battlefield on the day of the battle. You will find all kinds of maps that purport to be of the battle of balls bluff. Some appeared in newspapers not long after the battle. They were all secondhand. The shape of the field is all over the place. It is round, square, a diamond. The size of the field changes depending on who is writing tout it, anywhere between 10 20 acres. This map is the map of the battlefield on the day of the battle. This was drawn by captain William Francis bartlett who commanded a company of the 20th massachusetts. He was on the field from don until dark. He was not in battle until noon from dawn until dark. Noon. Not in battle until he included this map in a letter to his mother. He does not include dimensions. You can figure that out. This one. Like to use all the other maps were either in newspapers or appear many years later. We will refer to those at different times. Early in the war, you have to understand just how early in the war this battle was. It is october of 1861. Write in the middle of the organizational gear, that first year of the war. , thatanizational year first year of the war. There is not relatively speaking a lot going on. Understand this obviously there is a u. S. Army, but you have both sides trying to create these massive armies that will meet later in the war. They simply do not exist. The logistical tail to support those armies does not exist. That is what they are starting to do. In the American Experience prior to the war the largest army we had ever put into the field was winfield scots army in mexico. Depending on who you read, then numbers very. He conquered mexico with 12,000 men. 12,000 men is one division at the start of the civil war. The u. S. Army is not in existence. Command structure of that army consists of four generals and 19 colonels. What is about to be created, these huge armies, we have no experience with that. Idea where you even start. You a captain out west somewhere, you need a few horses for your company. You say i need three or four horses, fine, i will buy them. You take them back to camp, a guy puts shoes on them and youre good to go. You are a lt. Col. Several years i, you are assigned will need 10,000 horses the month after that. Or do you start . Where do you start . They do at the start of the year. They are creating the logistical background to build the sinews of war. Congress has to authorize money. These people then have to go out contract speaking about are your people who disbursing officers go out and contract with people to get all these horses. They have to take them someplace. By the time they get them to a Central Location you need to have facilities ready for them. You need a contract for a water forage and green for these horses, you have to create a Veterinary Service for these tens of thousands of horses. All of this has to start from scratch. That is why in the first year of the war there is not a lot going on. You have first manassas and that is a small battle by later war standards. That is part of why balls bluff stood out. It is slap in the middle of this organizational year. From that point, until the spring of 62, there is not much. Balls bluff stands out because it is in the middle of that, and also for a couple other reasons. It is fought north of the national capital. That is freaky. Is unionists, this battle actually north of the capital. Off, thenrows people you have a couple other things going on. There is a u. S. Senator killed their. Killed there isly in the war, all of this happening. Indications of how early in the war we are uniforms. Everyone knows about the first manassas. Armies, theythe original name the original name of the army in the east was changed to army of the potomac. Theyinal name of the swap names basically. At the time of balls bluff they are both called the army of the potomac. It is very early in the war. Other things, the level of command experience as i have said you have at the dutch in the u. S. Army at the time for colonels. You have at the time in the u. S. Army for youve got Winfield Scott but he is past his prime. He will not be doing anything in the field. You have all of these guys who are generals who used to be lieutenants last time they did anything unless you count fighting indians, which is a whole different dynamic. A confederate general previously u. S. Army officer said after the war at the beginning of the war i knew everything there was to know about commanding 50 dragons. That is pretty much the command level experiment experience that you had. This is onthejob training for these people. It is bubbling up like that. We have gone over the maps. , why are thetself troops there what is going on. You have to look at first 21st 1861. July you hear occasionally people will write why didnt the confederates sweep into d. C. They were in no shape to do that. They fall back. Confederates fall back to bull run itself which fall flows into the occoquan. They have a water line defense. The potomac becomes a kind of moat to protect washington. You have got these two waterlines of defense about 30 miles apart. People are pretty much leaving each other alone. A cavalry patrol bumps into somebody or something, but basically they leave each other alone. Confederates are made maintaining outposts. These outposts are mainly in the washington dc area on months until. You have all seen that famous photo of the unfinished dome of the capital the confederates can see that. They are keeping an eye on what the yanks are going to do. Theres one of their post the confederates maintain and that is at leesburg. That is because of the road intersection on your map, particularly route 15. You combine that road with the fact that the Potomac River is right there. 25 Potomac River in that mile or so stretch where it forms the border between virginia and maryland is fairly easy to cross. There are a lot of places to cross the river in that stretch. There were Three Bridges but they were burned in 1861. Rry sites. Fe forts,re 14 usable militarily usable. The bottom is fern so your wagons and artillery will not sink to their hubs when you get them there. The banks of the rivers are canou have 19 of them, you cross the troops anywhere there where they will be within supporting distance of each other on either side. If you combine the ease of crossing the river with that eastwest running highway, you could argue that at that point and they wore postmanassas, summer into the fall of 61, Loudoun County was arguably the strategically most important piece of ground in north america. That road gave each side access to the flanks of the other army. Weber controlled those River Crossings and that road, you can go whoever controlled those River Crossings and that road, that piece of ground mattered in 1861. Who is there . The confederates had a small men, may belet 3000 a few less. The numbers were always the federals had bad information. Stone thought that the confederates had 4000. If you do the math, about 3000. On the other of the river, the federals had two brigades, augmented in early october by a large third brigade, another 5000 men, which bump them up to 12,000. On the confederate side, you had a number of regiments. 18thad the 13th, mississippi. You had the eighth virginia. It was a local Loudoun County unit. Six of the 10 counties were from Loudoun County. They are the home team. Those guys knew that area. They had some artillery. The First Company of the richmond hausers were there. Hey had to six pounders early october they get a fifth gun, which the record identifies only as an iron rifled gun. Do not know exactly what that was. It confederates did not use at balls bluff. They did not bring any artillery to balls bluff. They had some cavalry. Partf which later became of either the fourth or sixth virginia cavalry. This was roughly a 3000 men brigade. Evans, west point, west point buddies nicknamed him s because he was knock kneed. Shanks was a good fighter. He had been involved in hand to hand combat in indian battles, he had taken arrow wounds. You look at photos of him and he looks like he is insane. He has general sherman eyes. Shanks evans has these eyes that you do not want to mess with it this guy. Also drank a lot. He was accused of being drunk at balls bluff. If he was drunk at balls bluff, it did not hurt because he did what he needed to do. You kind of have to think of grant in that regard. Grant is accused of drinking all the time, but not so much when he was actually dizzy. Evans actually busy. Evans not so much. Force had twoe brigades, about 7000 men for most of the summer. The trips that we need to be concerned about as far as balls bluff is the theft 15th and new york. Those were two independent regiments. Had three actually two brigades, one that contained units. The first minnesota, the 20th massachusetts, the seventh michigan. Except for the 20th massachusetts, minnesota and ballsan, were not at bluff. They were at eds edwards ferry. Then you have some artillery. Brought some guns to cross over to balls bluff. Only one of them got there. He also had a couple of mountain hausers that belong to the new york state militia. All the new york state militia units were militia, but they had one company dedicated to artillery. They eventually rogoff and became an independent new york ottery. New york battery. Any cavalry tove speak of involved in bills bluff. You have these two forces spending the summer following first manassas watching each other over the river. The men on both sides very quickly came to make localized truces so that they would not would notht there get shot right there. Hey, yank, i will not shoot at you if you do not shoot at me. Works for me. It was a pretty pleasant time. One Union Officer later wrote about his time during that summer and fall around leesburg and Montgomery County maryland and he described it as a very civil war unquote a very civil war. Up at theng gens end of this period. In early october general stone men reinforcements of 5000 called the california brigade, consisting of four regiments, ae first, second, third, and fourth californian. These were all pennsylvanians. The fact that they were called californians the recruitment effort for this he called a pious fraud. Shortly after fort sumter, baker who was at the time a u. S. Senator from the new state of oregon had been associated with california for much of the 1850s, was a very wellknown public figure. He was a senator from oregon. He is back doing his senate thing in washington dc. Or it is fired on. With west coast connections want to organize a west coast regiment. He want to get to the west coast states symbolically tied to the union because there were secession movements in california. There was no guarantee that those two states would stick. There was not a risk that they would join the confederacy, but more so that they would break away and join a west coast union. If we if we can get a regiment of california troops, that will symbolically tie the west coast to the union and all of that will be a good thing for the union. How are we going to get california troops . California is on the fort far side of the moon. No railroads go out there. Or either walk, ride horses, you go on a ship. Either way you look at it you are looking at five months before you can get california troops out there. The wars get to be over by then anyway, right . So you do not worry about that. Baker and some of these other fors say lets just recruit what we will call the california regiment. For people whog used to live in california. An old 49er or someone who had been to disneyland. Aboutidnt really care that. They just wanted the name. They organize this regiment. They get a few hundred men in new york, then they discover the fella who is doing most of their he says, i know philadelphia better than i do new york, im going to move this to philadelphia. He turns out to be a very good recruiter. He wants 1000 men. He gets 5000 men to sign up. That inlaid they do not have a regiment. Have the makings of suddenly they do not have a regiment. You have the makings of a brigade. Going to be the fourth californian never got organized. They had these 5000 men and they divvied them up between four regiments. And fifth were standard sized. These guys show up, in general stones area. Third, fifth. To 12,000 overnight. You are shanks evans you are the confederate commander. You have been looking at 7000 yankees over the river and suddenly you are looking at 12,000. He begins to wonder what is going on here. Anotherinth and 10th, division crosses the river up near d. C. They cross into virginia, get onto what is the georgetown pike and they work their way up into langley, virginia. On the top of the highest hill in langley where the Central Intelligence headquarters are today for the same reason visibility, communications, high ground. Langley,12,000 in which is 25 miles away, but it is connected by a good road. The georgetown pike is a good road. If you go as far as drains bill intersects with route 7 drainsville it intersects with route seven. Where are all the confederates . They are in fairfax, not connected by good roads. You are shanks evans and you are thinking a week ago i had 7000 yanks. Yanksare another 12,000 within striking distance. He starts to worry about getting gobbled up. At Harpers Ferry there is a little skirmish involving none other then john gary who pops up all kinds of places. Athad heard that over Harpers Ferry the confederates had been gathering up some food stuffs and they had basically a wagon train. He said, lets go get it. Gets shanks evans attention. He is thinking i have yankees across the river, upriver, i have all these guys downriver and he begins imagining a threepronged involved envelopment. In fact, a lot of what you will read about pauls bluff says saysthat is balls bluff that is what it was. N attempt to encircle leesburg. You will sometime see maps with three big like arrows and circling leesburg saying this is what was happening. It was not. Sees all of this, he knows he only has 3000 men. He knows he will not get any timely help from the rest of the confederate army. He gets spooked as a result of this Harpers Ferry episode and he leaves. He packs his brigade up and go south to goose creek where the road crosses goose creek. He sets up a new defensive position there. What is odd about that is he does that without getting permission from anybody. He does it on his own. Message to general beauregard, his immediate sub. Superior. Ediate beauregard is not happy. He has turned over a strategically significant River Crossing, the invasion route, he has given that to the union forces. They had recognized immediately whatd they had, what a gift today had they could have simply walking walked into leesburg without firing a shot. He leaves. He sends a message to general beauregard. General beauregard is not happy. E sends a message act back it is very flowery, polite, 19th century military language. The general wishes to know why you have taken this decision as you have neglected to inform him. Read between the lines are you note says is, out of your freaking mind . He gets his wrist slapped and he turns around and takes his men back up to leesburg. Get takes about 2. 5 days your wrist slapped, feel contrite, go back up to leesburg. During those days they yanks realize, hey, they are gone, we think. Dividedcounty was a county. About a third of the voting population voted to stay in the union. The reason for that is because in Loudoun County, in the northwestern quadrant of Loudoun County was divided from the rest of the county kind of by some cultures, but mainly by because many of