Second Battle of Manassas

RESULTS OF SECOND BATTLE OF MANASSAS. Second Manassas offers an interesting contrast to the opening battle which had found two armies of raw, undisciplined volunteers courageously but falteringly battling for supremacy. The raw volunteers had now been replaced by seasoned veterans, hardened by months of strenuous campaigning. The campaign just ended had been one to test to the utmost the endurance and discipline of the men in the ranks of both armies—a test they had met with valor and high honor. In contrast to the rout of First Manassas, the Federal army which now retired upon Washington was a weary but defiant fighting machine. Its defeat had been accomplished by exceptional daring, combined with a skillful coordination of Confederate commands. Gambling with long chances, Lee had succeeded in removing some 150,000 invading troops from deep in Virginia and reversing the threat of impending attack upon the opposing capital.

Commenting upon the battle, Henderson, the English soldier and historian, writes:

. . . If, as Moltke avers, the junction of two armies on the field of battle is the highest achievement of military genius, the campaign against Pope has seldom been surpassed; and the great counter-stroke at Manassas is sufficient in itself to make Lee's reputation as a tactician. . . . It was not due to the skill of Lee that Pope weakened his left at the crisis of battle. But in the rapidity with which the opportunity was seized, in the combination of the three arms, and in the vigour of the blow, Manassas is in no way inferior to Austerlitz or Salamanca.

This brilliant success did much to offset Confederate reverses in the West—the loss of Missouri, the defeats of Forts Henry and Donelson, Shiloh, and the fall of Nashville, New Orleans, and Memphis. Contrary to the inactivity that followed First Manassas, Lee pressed his victory by the first invasion of the North. On September 4, he began moving his troops across the Potomac with the hope of winning the support of Maryland and possibly the recognition of the Confederacy by foreign powers. In the desperately fought battle of Antietam, September 17, at Sharpsburg, Md., however, these hopes were dashed by McClellan, now returned to Federal command.