Lee had entrenched on the line of crescent-shaped
hills behind the town.
When the new Northern Commander threw his army, with its bands playing
and its thousand flags flying, against these hills on the morning of
December 13, 1862, he plunged headlong and blindfolded into a death
trap.
Charge after charge was repulsed with unparalleled slaughter. Lee's guns
were planted to cross fire on each charging line of blue. Burnside's
men were mowed down in thousands until their sublime valor won the
praise and the pity of their foe.
When night at last drew the veil over the awful scene the shattered
masses of the charging army were huddled under the shelter of the houses
in Fredericksburg leaving the field piled high with the dead and the
wounded. The wounded were freezing to death in the pitiless cold.
Burnside had lost thirteen thousand men--the flower of his troops--the
bravest men the North had ever sent into battle.
Jackson's keen eye was quick to see the shambles into which this
demoralized army had been pushed. The river behind them could be crossed
only on a narrow pontoon bridge. A swift and merciless night attack
would either drive the bleeding lines into the freezing river,
annihilate or capture the whole army.
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