190

THE ELEVENTH CORPS AT CHANCELLORSVILLE.

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THE OLD CHANCELLOR HOUSE, BURNED DURING THE BATTLE. FROM A PHOTOGRAPH.

held, for his line of battle, a comparatively short front between the Rapp a 'hannock and the Catherine Furnace, not exceeding two miles and a half idextent. His right wing, not far from the river, was behind Mott’s Run, whichflows due east, and his left was deployed along the Catherine Furnace road.

Could Hooker, 011 the first day of May, have known Lee’s exact locationhe never could have had a better opportunity for taking the offensive. Hidhe did not know, and after the few troops advancing toward Fredericksburg had met the approaching enemy he ordered all back to the “old position,the Chancellorsville line, which I have just described.

On the preceding Thursday, the last of April, the three corps that con'stituted the right wing of the army, Meade’s, Slocum’s, and mine, had crossedfrom the north to the south side of the Rapidau, and by 4 o’clock in the aft® 1 ''noon had reached the vicinity of Chancellorsville, where Slocum, whothe senior commander present, established his headquarters. I, approachingfrom Germ anna Ford, halted my divisions at Dowdall’s Tavern and encamp eCt them there. Then I rode along the Plank road through the almost continuousforest to the Chancellorsville House. There I reported to Slocum. He sadthat the orders were for me to cover the right of the general line, posting dAcommand near Dowdall’s Tavern. Tie pointed to a place on the map mark®“Mill” near there, on a branch of Hunting Run [see map, p. 193], and sai >“ Establish your right there.” General Slocum promised, with the TwelR .Corps, to occupy the space between his headquarters and Dowdall’s clearing’but, finding the distance too great, one of his division commanders sent dFword that I must cover the last three-quarters of a mile of the Plank r° a