ee small brigades, hurried into position and unprotected by
intrenchments, avail against 25,000 Southerners, led by Stonewall
Jackson, and animated by their easy victory? If Berry and Hays could
stand fast against the rush of fugitives, it was all that could be
expected; and as the uproar in the dark woods swelled to a deeper
volume, and the yells of the Confederates, mingled with the crash of
the musketry, were borne to his ears, Hooker must have felt that all
was lost. To make matters worse, as Pleasonton, hurrying back with
his cavalry, arrived at Hazel Grove, the trains of the Third Army
Corps, fired on by the Confederate skirmishers, dashed wildly across
the clearing, swept through the parked artillery, and, breaking
through the forest, increased the fearful tumult which reigned round
Chancellorsville.

The gunners, however, with a courage beyond all praise, stood
staunchly to their pieces; and soon a long line of artillery, for
which two regiments of the Third Army Corps, coming up rapidly from
the south, formed a sufficient escort, was established on this
commanding hill. Other batteries, hitherto held in reserve, took post
on the high ground at Fairview, a mile to the north-east, and,
although Berry's infantry were not yet in position, and the stream of
broken troops was still pouring past, a strong front of fifty guns
opposed the Confederate advance.

But it was not the artillery that saved Hooker from irretrievable
disaster.* (* Lieutenant-Colonel Hamlin, the latest historian of
Chancellorsville, has completely disposed of the legend that these
fifty guns repulsed a desperate attack on Hazel Grove.) As they
followed the remnants of the Eleventh Army Corps, the progress of
Rodes and Colston had been far less rapid than when they stormed
forward past the Wilderness Church. A regiment of Federal cavalry,
riding to Howard's aid by a track from Hazel Grove to the plank road,
was quickly swept aside; but the deep darkness of the forest, the
efforts of the officers to re-form the ranks, the barriers opposed by
the tangled undergrowth, the difficulty of keeping the direction,
brought a large portion of the troops to a standstill. At the
junction of the White House road the order to halt was given, and
although a number of men, pushing impetuously forward, seized a line
of log breastworks which ran north-west through the timber below the
Fairview heights, the pursuit was stayed in the midst of the dense
thickets.