Still there were no grounds for uneasiness.  If the troops made sixteen miles before nightfall, they would be before Culpeper soon after dawn, and sixteen miles was no extraordinary march for the Valley regiments.  But to accomplish a long march in the face of the enemy, something is demanded more than goodwill and endurance on the part of the men.  If the staff arrangements are faulty, or the subordinate commanders careless, the best troops in the world will turn sluggards.  It was so on August 8.  Jackson’s soldiers never did a worse day’s work during the whole course of his campaigns.  Even his energy was powerless to push them forward.  The heat, indeed, was excessive.  Several men dropped dead in the ranks; the long columns dragged wearily through the dust, and the Federal cavalry was not easily pushed back.  Guns and infantry had to be brought up before Bayard’s dismounted squadrons were dislodged.  But the real cause of delay is to be found elsewhere.  Not only did General Hill misunderstand his orders, but, apparently offended by Jackson’s reticence, he showed but little zeal.  The orders were certainly incomplete.  Nothing had been said about the supply trains, and they were permitted to follow their divisions, instead of moving in rear of the whole force.  Ewell’s route, moreover, was changed without Hill being informed.  The lines of march crossed each other, and Hill was delayed for many hours by a long column of ambulances and waggons.  So tedious was the march that when the troops halted for the night, Ewell had made eight miles, Hill only two, and the latter was still eighteen miles from Culpeper.  Chagrined by the delay, Jackson reported to Lee that “he had made but little progress, and that the expedition,” he feared, “in consequence of his tardy movements, would be productive of little good.”

How the blame should be apportioned it is difficult to say.  Jackson laid it upon Hill.  And that officer’s conduct was undoubtedly reprehensible.  The absence of Major Dabney, struck down by sickness, is a possible explanation of the faulty orders.  But that Jackson would have done better to have accepted Lee’s hint, to have confided his intentions to his divisional commanders, and to have trusted something to their discretion, seems more than clear.  In war, silence is not invariably a wise policy.  It was not a case in which secrecy was all-important.  The movement had already been discovered by the Federal cavalry, and in such circumstances the more officers that understood the intention of the general-in-chief the better.  Men who have been honoured with their leader’s confidence, and who grasp the purpose of the efforts they are called upon to make, will co-operate, if not more cordially, at least more intelligently, than those who are impelled by the sense of duty alone.