Warren and the II Corps quickly made their way to Catlett Station and headed north along the Orange and Alexandria Railroad making it to Kettle Run by about 1:30 PM on October 14th. A.P. Hill’s Third Corps was headed northeast on the Greenwich Road. There he ran into stragglers from French’s III Corps and captured about 150 Federals. A mile west of Bristoe Station Hill they spotted another group of Union soldiers along the west side of the railroad. These men were the rearguard of the Union V Corps under Major General George Sykes. Sykes was under orders from Meade to wait for the bulk of Warren’s men to arrive at Bristoe Station before moving further north.

Sykes was getting more and more anxious as he waited. As he spotted the lead elements of Warren’s Corps he began to prepare to leave. Hill thought he had come upon the fleeing rear of French’s III Corps. It was at this point that Hill would make a terrible mistake that later both he and General Lee would come to regret. He would decide to attack the rear of the V Corps with Major General Henry Heth’s division and Lieutenant Colonel William Poague’s artillery without conducting a thorough reconnaissance of the ground. Hill did not see Warren’s Corps on the other side of the elevated railroad bank. Poague opened fire on Sykes Corps sending them fleeing toward Centreville. Brigadier General Alexander Webb commanding Warren’s leading division deployed the 7th MI, 59th NY and the 1st MN on the other side of the tracks as skirmishers. Heth was ordered to wheel his line to the right and attack the Federals west of the railroad.

You can see from map below what Hill and Heth eventually had gotten themselves into. They would be attacking a Union Corps which were in an excellent defensive position concealed behind a railroad bed. Initially, as Brigadier General John Cooke and Brigadier General William Kirkland’s brigades (5000 men) attacked not all of the Union II Corps was up and they had a numerical advantage. Colonel Francis Heath and Colonel James Mallon from Alexander Webb’s division were at the head of the Union column. Brigadier General John Owen and Colonel Thomas Smyth’s brigades of Brigadier General Alexander Hays’s division were close behind. The key to the battle for the Union would be whether they could get a sufficient force in place on the east side of the railroad that extended to Broad Run and was not outflanked by the oncoming Rebel line on the Union left. Fortunately for the Union Warren was at the head of the column.

He quickly positioned artillery under Lieutenant T. Frederick Brown, Captain R. Bruce Ricketts and Captain William Arnold, a total of 14 guns, on the Union right and they opened fire on Cooke and Kirkland who were wounded and quickly taken out of the fight destroying the Confederate front line command structure. The North Carolinians could not see Heath and Mallon behind the railroad bed so they focused their fire on the skirmishers and artillery. As this was occurring Owen and Smyth came out of the woods and across a field and were placed on the Union left. The two brigades suffered about 150 casualties in the process. Now Warren had about 4300 men in place and as the North Carolinians got within 200 yards they were hit by a heavy fire. The Rebels were faced with the choice of whether to retreat or charge and they charged. Cooke’s brigade took heavy losses and stalled near the Davis farm before they could reach the railroad. On the Rebel left the 11th and 52nd NC reached the railroad near Broad Run as did the 26th NC a little further south. Brown’s artillery and the 19th Maine reversed the breakthrough near Broad Run. Mallon’s brigade sealed the breakthrough near the Brentsville Road but Colonel James Mallon was killed in the process. He was the highest ranking Union officer killed in the battle. Heavy Union fire along the line forced the Rebels to retreat. In the retreat the Union seized the five guns of McIntosh’s artillery battery. It may have been the first time in the war that a retreating army captured artillery from an attacking army.

The rest of Hill and Warren’s forces had now arrived on the field and is shown in the map below. Colonel Thomas Smyth’s brigade advanced but were pushed back by Brigadier General Carnot Posey’s Mississippians and Brigadier General Edward Perry’s Floridians. As Posey’s brigade was lying in the field a pice of shrapnel from an exploding artillery shell struck Posey’s left thigh. He was subsequently evacuated to Charlottesville where he had attended law school at the University of Virginia (see post). Infection set in and he died there a month later becoming the highest ranking Confederate officer to die during the battle. It was now approaching 6:00 PM and the sun was setting. Lee’s entire army (40,000 men) was positioned across the railroad from Warren’s 11,000 man II Corps. Some skirmishing occurred on the Union left but by the time the Rebels could get into position it was dark.

There is a marker that covers the “missed opportunity” of the skirmishing. The first is an older tablet that includes a map of the battlefield at the time. This has been replaced by a newer version at the same location that does not include a map. Both are shown below.

At midnight Warren quietly evacuated his Corps along the railroad to Centreville. The Union army had escaped. The next morning on the 15th as Lee road over the field with Hill he is reported to have said “Well, well, General, bury these poor men and let us say nothing more about it.” Other sources report a much harsher conversation between the two.

The Bristoe Station 1863 Trail interprets the battle

Stop 1- Lee Catches Meade

Stop 2- In the Footsteps of North Carolina

Stop 3- McIntosh’s Battery

Stop 4- I Expect We Had Better Charge

Stop 5- Davis Family Farmstead

The photos below were shot from the other side of the tracks in the railroad bed looking toward the opposite side that the Confederates would be approaching. It was an excellent defensive position.

Stop 6- We Are In Hell and Fire On All Sides

Stop 7- We Have Never Blushed Before

Next- The Battle of Buckland Mills

Sources

A Want of Vigilance The Bristoe Station Campaign October 9-19, 1863. Emerging Civil War Series. by Bill Backus and Robert Orrison.

Bristoe Station Blue and Gray Magazine Volume XXVI #2, 2009.