16. The Mud March of January, 1863
Major General Ambrose Burnside led the Union Army to a crushing and humiliating defeat at the Battle of Fredericksburg in December, 1862. The bloody debacle prevented his army from crossing the Rappahannock River, and continuing down the peninsula to Richmond. The following month he determined to try again, seven miles south of Fredericksburg, supported by diversions north of the town. Lincoln intervened, ordering the Army to remain where it was. After days of political scheming and maneuvering, Burnside offered a revised plan to cross the river north of Fredericksburg with the main body of the Army. Lincoln ultimately approved, but then the weather intervened. Unusually mild temperatures and heavy rains swelled the river, and turned the roads to mire.
The river swelled to the point that the pontoon bridges were inadequate to cross it, and as engineers struggled to add more the army became, literally, stuck in the mud. Artillery pieces and caissons sank in mud up to their axles. Horses and mules struggled to free them until they dropped from exhaustion. Men found themselves stuck in sticky mud up to their knees. The rain continued. None of the Union Army units crossed the river, where Lee’s Army of Northern Virginia waited to annihilate them if they did. On the second day of the attempt, January 22, the weather was worse. Burnside gave up, ordered the Army to retire to winter quarters, and waited for his inevitable termination as Commander of the Army. It came on January 26.
