But Pope, full of the idea that Jackson had been stopped in attempting to retreat through Thoroughfare Gap, altogether misunderstood the situation.  He was badly informed.  He did not know even the position of his own troops.  His divisions, scattered over a wide extent of country, harassed by Stuart’s cavalry, and ignorant of the topography, had lost all touch with the Commander-in-Chief.  Important dispatches had been captured.  Messages and orders were slow in arriving, if they arrived at all.  Even the generals were at a loss to find either the Commander-in-Chief or the right road.  McDowell had ridden from Gainesville to Manassas in order to consult with Pope, but Pope had gone to Centreville.  McDowell thereupon set out to rejoin his troops, but lost his way in the forest and went back to Manassas.  From Ricketts Pope received no information whatever.* (* Ricketts’ report would have been transmitted through McDowell, under whose command he was, and as McDowell was not to be found, it naturally went astray.) He was not aware that after a long skirmish at Thoroughfare Gap, Longstreet had opened the pass by sending his brigades over the mountains on either hand, threatening both flanks of the Federals, and compelling them to retire.  He was not aware that King’s division, so far from intercepting Jackson’s retreat, had abandoned the field of Groveton at 1 A.M., and, finding its position untenable in face of superior numbers, had fallen back on Manassas; or that Ricketts, who had by this time reached Gainesville, had in consequence continued his retreat in the same direction.

Seldom have the baneful effects of dispersion been more strikingly illustrated, and the difficulty, under such circumstances, of keeping the troops in the hand of the Commander-in-Chief.  On the morning of the 28th Pope had ordered his army to march in three columns on Manassas, one column starting from Warrenton Junction, one from Greenwich, and one from Buckland Mills, the roads which they were to follow being at their furthest point no more than seven miles apart.  And yet at dawn on the 29th he was absolutely ignorant of the whereabouts of McDowell’s army corps; he was but vaguely informed of what had happened during the day; and while part of his army was at Bald Hill, another part was at Centreville, seven miles north-east, and a third at Manassas and at Bristoe, from seven to twelve miles south-east.  Nor could the staff be held to blame for the absence of communication between the columns.  In peace it is an easy matter to assume that a message sent to a destination seven miles distant by a highroad or even country lanes arrives in good time.  Seven miles in peace are very short.  In war, in the neighbourhood of the enemy, they are very long.  In peace, roads are easy to find.  In war, it is the exception that they are found, even when messengers are provided with good maps and the country is thickly populated; and it is from war that the soldier’s trade is to be learned.