And yet his order to Sedgwick was (as he construes it), blindly to throw himself into this impossible situation, and lose every man in his command rather than not make the attempt at once, and without waiting properly to dispose his men, or feel the enemy.

As to the leisurely marching of two or three miles on Sunday, we have seen how Brooks’s march was summarily arrested at Salem Church, and how his attempt to force a passage, cost him alone some fifteen hundred men.

There is a good deal of evidence difficult to deal with in this movement of the Sixth Corps.  The report of Gen. Howe, written immediately after the campaign, states facts dispassionately, and is to the point and nothing more.  This is as it should be in the report of a general to his superior.  It has but one error of consequence, viz., the assumption that the three divisions of Anderson, McLaws, and Early, all under command of Gen. Lee, attacked his line, leaving no force in front of Brooks and Newton.  It was Early alone, or Early assisted by a brigade of Anderson, who attacked Howe.

But his testimony a year later, before the Committee on the Conduct of the War, cannot be commended as dispassionate, and contains serious errors.  Gen. Howe states that the order to advance towards Chancellorsville was received “just after dark, say eight o’clock,” whereas it was not sent until nine P.M. from Chancellorsville, and ten P.M. from Falmouth; nor did Sedgwick receive it until eleven P.M.  Howe evidently remembered the order to pursue by the Bowling-Green road, as the one to march to Chancellorsville,—­when speaking of time of delivery.  The deductions Gen. Howe makes from errors like this are necessarily somewhat warped.  But let us give all due weight to the testimony of an able soldier.  He states that his attack on Marye’s heights was made on a mere notice from Sedgwick, that he was about to attack, and desired Howe to assist; that he received on Sunday evening a bare intimation only from Sedgwick, that the left of the corps must be protected, and that he consequently moved his own left round to the river; and later, that Sedgwick sent him word to strengthen his position for defence; but complains that Sedgwick did not properly look after his division.  “Not receiving any instruction or assistance from Gen. Sedgwick, I felt that we were left to take care of ourselves.  It seemed to me, from the movements or arrangements made during the day, that there was a want of appreciation or a misunderstanding of the position which we held.”  Sedgwick’s entire confidence in Howe’s ability to handle his division, upon general instructions of the object to be attained, might account fully for a large part of this apparent vagueness.  But Howe does not look at it in this light.  His opinion was, that no necessity existed for the Sixth Corps to fall back across the river.