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director of the Hofburg theatre in succession to Franz Dingel- | (1905) 3734. It contains an Evangelical, a Roman Catholic stedt, an office he held until 1887. In this year he returned to and an English church, and has some small manufactures his native town of Rostock, and remained actively engaged in (cigars, paper and toys). Its thermal alkaline springs have a literary production. Wilbrandt is distinguished both as a temperature of 90°-100° Fahr. and are used for bathing in cases dramatist and novelist. His merits were acknowledged by the of paralysis, rheumatism, gout, neuralgia and similar ailments. award of the Grillparzer prize on two occasions-in 1875 for The fact that the springs rise within the baths, and are thus the tragedy Gracchus der Volkstribun, and in 1890 for his dramatic used at the fountain-head, is considered to contribute materially poem Der Meister von Palmyra, while in 1878 he received the to their curative value. The water is used internally for affections Schiller prize for his dramatic productions. of the stomach and digestive organs, and of the kidneys, bladder, &c. Wildbad possesses all the usual arrangements for the comfort and amusement of the visitors (over 15,000 annually), including large and well-appointed hotels, a Kurhaus, a TrinkHalle and promenades. The neighbourhood is picturesque, the most attractive spot being the Wildsee, of which legends are told.

Among his plays may be mentioned the tragedies, Arria und Messalina (1874), Nero (1876); Kriemhild (1877); the comedies Unerreichbar (1870), Die Maler (1872), Jugendliebe (1873) and Der Kampf ums Dasein (1874); and the drama Die Tochter des Herrn Fabricius (1883). Among his novels the following deserve notice:-Meister Amor (1880); Hermann Ifinger (1892); Der Dornenweg (1894); Die Osterinsel (1895); Die Rothenburger (1895); and Hildegard Mahlmann (1897). He also published translations of Sophocles and Euripides (1866), Gedichte (1874, 1889 and 1907), and a volume of Erinnerungen (1905).

See V. Klemperer, Adolf Wilbrandt. Eine Studie über seine Werke (1907), and A. Stern, Studien zur Literatur der Gegenwart (3rd ed., 1905).

WILBYE, JOHN, English 16th-century madrigal composer, was born probably at Bury St Edmunds, but the details of his life are obscure. A set of madrigals by him appeared in 1598 and a second in 1608, the two sets containing sixty-four pieces; and from a few contributions known to have been made by him to other contemporary sets, we can infer that he was alive in 1614. He is the most famous of all the English madrigalists; his pieces have long been favourites and are included in modern collections.

See W. T. v. Renz, Die Kur zu Wildbad (with Guide, Wildbad, 1888), and Weizsäcker, Wildbad (2nd ed., 1905).

WILDE, OSCAR O'FLAHERTIE WILLS (1856-1900), English author, son of Sir William Wilde, a famous Irish surgeon, was born in Dublin on the 15th of October 1856; his mother, Jane Francisca Elgee, was well known in Dublin as a graceful writer of verse and prose, under the pen-name of "Speranza." Having distinguished himself in classics at Trinity College, Dublin, Oscar Wilde went to Magdalen College, Oxford, in 1874, and won the Newdigate prize in 1878 with his poem "Ravenna," besides taking a first-class in classical Moderations and in Literae Humaniores. But his career at Oxford, brilliant intellectually as he showed himself to be, was chiefly signalized by the part he played in what came to be known as the aesthetic movement. He adopted what to undergraduates appeared the effeminate pose of casting scorn on manly sports, wearing his hair long, decorating his rooms with peacock's feathers, lilies, sunflowers, blue china and other objets d'art, which he declared his desire to "live up to," affecting a lackadaisical manner, and professing intense emotions on the subject of "art for art's sake "-then a new-fangled doctrine which J. M. Whistler was bringing into prominence. Wilde made himself the apostle of this new cult. At Oxford his behaviour procured him a ducking in the Cherwell, and a wrecking of his rooms, but the cult spread among certain sections of society to such an extent that languishing attitudes, too-too costumes and "aestheticism" generally became a recognized pose. Its affectations were burlesqued in Gilbert and Sullivan's travesty Patience (1881), which practically killed by ridicule the absurdities to which it had grown. At the same time it cannot be denied that the "aesthetic "movement, in the aspect fundamentally represented by the school of William Morris and Rossetti, had a permanent influence on

WILD, JONATHAN (c. 1682–1725), English criminal, was born about 1682 at Wolverhampton, where his father was a wig-maker. After being apprenticed to a local buckle-maker, he went to London to learn his trade, and, getting into debt, was imprisoned for several years. The acquaintance of many criminals which he made in prison he turned to account after his release by setting up as a receiver of stolen goods. Wild shrewdly realized that it was safer, and in most cases more profitable, to dispose of such property by returning it to its legitimate owners than to sell it, with the attendant risks, in the open market, and he thus built up an immense business, posing as a recoverer of stolen goods, the thieves receiving a commission on the price paid for recovery. A special act of parliament was passed by which receivers of stolen property were made accessories to the theft, but Wild's professed "lost property office" had little difficulty in evading the new law, and became so prosperous that two branch offices were opened. From profiting by robberies in which he had no share, Wild naturally came to arrange robberies himself, and he devised and controlled a huge organiza-English decorative art. As the leading "aesthete," Oscar tion, which plundered London and its approaches wholesale. Such thieves as refused to work with him received short shrift. The notorious Jack Sheppard, wearied of Wild's exactions, at last refused to deal with him, whereupon Wild secured his arrest, and himself arrested Sheppard's confederate, "Blueskin." In return for Wild's services in tracking down such thieves as he did not himself control, the authorities for some time tolerated the offences of his numerous agents, each a specialist in a particular kind of robbery, and so themselves strengthened his position. If an arrest were made, Wild had a plentiful supply of false evidence at hand to establish his agents' alibi, and he did not hesitate to obtain the conviction, by similar means, of such thieves as refused to recognize his authority. Such stolen property as could not be returned to the owners with profit was taken abroad in a sloop purchased for this work. At last either the authorities became more strict or Wild less cautious. He was arrested, tried at the Old Bailey, and after being acquitted on a charge of stealing lace, found guilty of taking a reward for restoring it to the owner without informing the police. He was hanged at Tyburn on the 24th of May 1725.

WILDBAD, a watering-place of Germany, in the kingdom of Württemberg, picturesquely situated 1475 ft. above the sea, in the romantic pine-clad gorge of the Enz in the Black Forest, 28 m. W. of Stuttgart and 14 E. of Baden-Baden by rail. Pop.

Wilde became one of the most prominent personalities of the day; apart from the ridicule he encountered, his affected paradoxes and his witty sayings were quoted on all sides, and in 1882 he went on a lecturing tour in the United States. In 1884 he married Constance Lloyd. He had already published in 1881 a selection of his poems, which, however, only attracted admiration in a limited circle. In 1888 appeared The Hoppy Prince and Other Tales, illustrated by Walter Crane and Jacomb Hood. This charming volume of fairy tales was followed up later by a second collection, The House of Pomegranates (1892), acknowledged by the author to be "intended neither for the British child nor the British public." In much of his writings, and in his general attitude, there was to most people an undertone of rather nasty suggestion which created prejudice against him, and his novel, The Picture of Dorian Gray (1891), with all its sparkle and cleverness, impressed them more from this point of view than from its purely literary brilliance. Wilde contributed some characteristic articles to the reviews, all coloured by his peculiar attitude towards art and life, and in 1891 republished three of them as a book called Intentions. His first real success with the larger public was as a dramatist with Lady Windermere's Fan at the St James's Theatre in 1893, followed by A Woman of No Importance (1893), An Ideal Husband (1895) and The Importance of Being Earnest (1895).

The

dramatic and literary ability shown in these plays, all of which | at Chancellorsville between the Army of the Potomac, under were published later in book form, was as undoubted as their diction and ideas were characteristically paradoxical. In 1893 the licenser of plays refused a licence to Wilde's Salome, but it was produced in French in Paris by Sarah Bernhardt in 1894. His success as a dramatist had by this time gone some way to disabuse hostile critics of the suspicions as regards his personal character which had been excited by the apparent looseness of morals which since his Oxford days it had always pleased him to affect; but to the consternation of his friends, who had ceased to credit the existence of any real moral obliquity, in 1895 came fatal revelations as the result of his bringing a libel action against the marquis of Queensberry; and at the Old Bailey, in May, Wilde was sentenced to two years' imprisonment with hard labour for offences under the Criminal Law Amendment Act. It was a melancholy end to what might have been a singularly brilliant career. Even after leaving prison he was necessarily an outcast from decent circles, and he lived mainly on the Continent, under the name of "Sebastian Melmoth." He died in Paris on the 30th of November 1900. In 1898 he published his powerful Ballad of Reading Gaol. His Collected Poems, containing some beautiful verse, had been issued in 1892. While in prison he wrote an apology for his life which was placed in the hands of his executor and published in 1905. The manuscripts of A Florentine Tragedy and an essay on Shakespeare's sonnets were stolen from his house in 1895. In 1904 a five-act tragedy, The Duchess of Padua, written by Wilde about 1883 for Mary Anderson, but not acted by her, was published in a German translation. (Die Herzogin von Padua, translated by Max Meyerfeld) in Berlin. It is still impossible to take a purely objective view of Oscar Wilde's work. The Old Bailey revelations removed all doubt as to the essential unhealthiness of his personal influence; but his literary genius was none the less remarkable, and his plays were perhaps the most original contributions to English dramatic writing during the period. (H. CH.)

WILDENBRUCH, ERNST VON (1845-1909), German poet and dramatist, was born on the 3rd of February 1845 at Beyrout in Syria, the son of the Prussian consul-general. Having passed his early years at Athens and Constantinople, where his father was attached to the Prussian legation, he came in 1857 to Germany, received his early schooling at the Pädagogium at Halle and the Französische Gymnasium in Berlin, and, after passing through the Cadet school, became, in 1863, an officer in the Prussian army. He abandoned the military career two years later, but was recalled to the colours in 1866 for the war with Austria. He next studied law at the university of Berlin, and again served in the army during the Franco-Prussian War, 1870-71. In 1876 Wildenbruch was attached to the foreign office, which he finally quitted in 1900 with the title of counsellor of legation. He achieved his first literary successes with the epics Vionville (1874) and Sedan (1875). After publishing a volume of poems, Lieder und Balladen (Berl., 1877; 7th ed., 1900), he produced, in 1882, the tragedy, Die Karolinger. Among his chief dramas may be mentioned the tragedy Harold (1882); Die Quilzows (1888); Der Generalfeldoberst (1889); Die HaubenLerche (1891); Heinrich und Heinrichs Geschlecht (1895); Die Tochter des Erasmus (1900); and König Laurin (1902). Wildenbruch was twice (in 1884 and 1896) awarded the Schiller prize, and was, in 1892, created a doctor of philosophy honoris causa by the university of Jena. He also wrote several volumes of short stories (Novellen, 1883; Neue Novellen, 1885; Tiefe Wasser, 1897, &c.). He died on the 15th of January 1909.

Cf. B. Litzmann, Das deutsche Drama in den Bewegungen der Gegenwart (1894; 4th ed., 1897); H. Bulthaupt, Dramaturgie des Schauspiels, vol. iv. (1901).

WILDERNESS, a large forest in Spottsylvania county, Virginia, U.S.A., on the S. bank of the Rapidan, extending from Mine Run on the E. to Chancellorsville on the W. It is famous in military history for the battles of Chancellorsville (1863) and Wilderness (1864) during the American Civil War. Chancellorsville.-In May 1863 a three days' battle was fought

General J. Hooker, and General Lee's Army of Northern Virginia, which had stemmed the tide of invasion in the East by taking up a defensive position along the right or south bank of the Rappahannock. General Burnside had suffered a severe repulse in front of the Confederate position at Fredericksburg in December 1862, and his successor resolved to adopt the alternative plan of turning Lee's flank and so gaining the road to Richmond. General Lee had meanwhile weakened his forces by detaching Longstreet's two divisions and the cavalry brigades of Hampton, Robertson and Jones. Hooker had now at his disposal 12,000 cavalry, 400 guns and 120,000 infantry and artillery, organized in seven corps (I. Reynolds, II. Couch, III. Sickles, V. Meade, VI. Sedgwick, XI. Howard, XII. Slocum). General Lee counted only 45,000 men of all arms effective. Hooker detached 10,000 cavalry under Stoneman and Sedgwick's corps (30,000) to demonstrate on his flanks along the Rapidan and at Fredericksburg, while with the remainder he moved up the Rappahannock and crossed that river and afterwards the Rapidan and on the 30th of April fixed his headquarters at Chancellorsville, a farmhouse in the Wilderness. Lee's cavalry under Stuart had duly reported the Federal movements and Lee called up "Stonewall" Jackson's four divisions from below the Massaponax as soon as Sedgwick's corps crossed the river at Fredericksburg. At Chancellorsville Anderson's division was in position, and McLaws was sent to support him, while Jackson took three divisions to the same point, leaving Early's division to observe Sedgwick. Hooker had cleared and entrenched a position in the forest, inviting attack from the E. or S. General Lee, however, discovered a route by which the Federals might be attacked from the N. and W., and Jackson was instructed to execute the turning movement and fall upon them. As soon as a brigade of cavalry was placed at his disposal Jackson marched westward with his corps of 22,000 men and by a détour of 15 m. gained the Federal right flank, while Anderson and McLaws with 20 guns and 12,000 men demonstrated in front of Hooker's army and so kept 90,000 men idle behind their earthworks. One of Stuart's cavalry brigades neutralized Stoneman's 10,000 horsemen. Sedgwick was being contained by Early. Jackson's attack surprised the Federals, who fled in panic at nightfall, but Jackson was mortally wounded. Next day the attack was resumed under the direction of Stuart, who was reinforced by Anderson, while McLaws now threatened the left flank of the Federals and Fitz Lee's cavalry brigade operated against their line of retreat. Hooker finally gained the shelter of an inner line of works covering the ford by which he must retreat. Meanwhile, Early had checked Sedgwick, but when at last the Federal corps was about to overwhelm the Confederate division Lee came to succour it. Then Sedgwick was assailed by Early, McLaws and Anderson, and driven over the Rappahannock to join the remainder of Hooker's beaten army, which had recrossed the Rapidan on the 5th of May and marched back to Falmouth. Phisterer's Record states that the Federal loss was 16,000 and that of the Confederates 12,000 men.

See A. C. Hamlin, Chancellorsville; G. F. R. Henderson, Stonewall
Jackson; A. Doubleday, Chancellorsville and Gettysburg, Battles and
Leaders of the Civil War and Official Records of the War of Secession.
(G. W. R.)

Grant's Campaign of the Wilderness and Cold Harbor.-On the evening of the 3rd of May 1864, after dark, the Army of the Potomac, commanded by Major-General G. G. Meade and consisting of the II., V. and VI., and Cavalry corps, left its winter quarters about Culpeper to manœuvre across the Rapidan with a view to fighting a battle at or near New Hope Church and Craig's Church. The army, and the IX. corps (Burnside), which was an independent command, were directed by Lieutenant-General Grant, the newly appointed commander of the armies of the United States, who accompanied Meade's headquarters. The opposing Army of Northern Virginia under General R. E. Lee lay in quarters around Orange Court House (A. P. Hill's corps), Verdiersville (Ewell's corps) and Gordonsville

(Longstreet's corps). The respective numbers were: Army of the Potomac, 98,000; IX. corps, 22,000; Army of Northern Virginia rather less than 70,000.

The crossing of the Rapidan was made at Germanna and Ely's Fords, out of reach of Lee's interference, and in a few hours the two leading corps had reached their halting-places-V., Wilderness Tavern; and II., Chancellorsville. The VI. followed the V. and halted south of Germanna Ford. Two of the three divisions of cavalry preceded the march, and scouted to the front and flanks. Controversy has arisen as to whether the early halt of the Union army in the midst of the Wilderness was not a serious

Grant's intention of avoiding a battle until he was clear of the Wilderness was not achieved, for Confederate infantry appeared on the Orange Turnpike east of Mine Run, where on his own initiative Warren had posted a division of the V. corps overnight as flank-guard, and some cavalry, judiciously left behind by Wilson at Parker's Store, became engaged a little later with hostile forces on the Orange Plank Road. This led to the suspension of the whole manoeuvre towards Lee's right rear. The first idea of the Union headquarters was that Lee was falling back to the North Anna, covered by a bold rearguard, which Grant and Meade arranged to cut off and destroy

Redrawn from The Wilderness and Cold Harbor, by permission of Hugh Rees, Ltd. error of judgment. The reason assigned was the necessity of by a convergent attack of Warren and Sedgwick. But the protecting an enormous wagon train, carrying 15 days' supplies appearance of infantry on the Plank Road as well as the Pike for the whole army, that was crossing after the II. corps at had shown that Lee intended to fight in the Wilderness, and Ely's Ford. Burnside's corps was far to the rear when the Hancock (II. corps) was called in from Todd's Tavern, while advance began, but by making forced marches it was able to one division (Getty's) of the VI. was hurried to the intersection reach Germanna Ford during the 5th of May. On that day the of the Brock and Plank roads to hold that point until Hancock's manœuvre towards Craig's Church was resumed at 5 A.M., arrival. Getty arrived just in time, for Confederate skirmishers Wilson's cavalry division moving from Parker's Store south-were found dead and wounded only 30 yds. from the cross roads. ward, the V. corps (Warren) moving from Wilderness Tavern The division then formed up to await Hancock's arrival up the towards Parker's Store, followed by the VI. under Sedgwick, Brock Road, practically unmolested, for Lee had only two of the II. from Chancellorsville by way of Todd's Tavern towards his corps on the ground (Hill on the Plank Road, Ewell on the Shady Grove Church. Of the other cavalry divisions, Gregg's Pike), and did not desire to force a decision until Longstreet's went towards Fredericksburg (near where the Confederate distant corps should arrive. cavalry corps had been reported) and Torbert's (which had acted as rearguard and watched the upper Rapidan during the first day's march) was not yet across the river.

Meanwhile Warren had been slowly forming up his attacking line with great difficulty in the woods. Grant appears to have used bitter words to Meade on the subject of Warren's delays,

and Meade passed these on to Warren, who in turn forced his subordinates into premature action. In the end, about noon, Griffin's division of Warren's corps attacked directly along the Pike and crushed the enemy's first line, but, unsupported by the VI. corps on the right and Wadsworth's division (V. corps) on the left, both of which units were still groping their way forward in the woods, was forced back with heavy losses. Wadsworth took a wrong direction in the woods and presented himself as an easy victim to Ewell's right, soon after Griffin's repulse. The VI. corps advanced later in the day on Warren's right, but was only partially engaged. The result of the attack on Ewell was thus completely unsatisfactory, and for the rest of the battle the V. and VI. corps were used principally as reservoirs to find supports for the offensive wing under Hancock, who arrived on the Plank Road about 2 P.M.

Hancock's divisions, as they came up, entrenched themselves along the Brock Road. In the afternoon he was ordered to attack whatever force of the enemy was on the Plank Road in front of him, but was unwilling to do so until he had his forces well in hand. Finally Getty was ordered to attack "whether Hancock was ready or not." ." This may have been an attempt to force Hancock's hand by an appeal to his soldierly honour, and as a fact he did not leave Getty unsupported. But the disjointed attacks of the II. corps on Hill's entrenchments, while forcing the Confederates to the verge of ruin, were not as successful as the preponderance of force on the Union side ought to have ensured. For four hours the two lines of battle were fighting 50 yds. apart, until at nightfall the contest was given up through mutual exhaustion.

The battle of the 6th was timed to begin at 5 A.M. and Grant's attack was wholly directed on Parker's Store, with the object of crushing Hill before Longstreet could assist him. If Longstreet, instead of helping Hill, were to attack the extreme Union left, so much the better; but the far more probable course for him to take was to support Hill on or north of the Plank Road, and Grant not only ordered Hancock with six of the eleven divisions of Meade's army to attack towards Parker's Store, but sent his Own mass of manoeuvre " (the IX. corps) thither in such a way as to strike Hill's left. The cavalry was drawn back for the was required in every musket protection of the trains, for " the ranks of the infantry. Warren and Sedgwick were to hold Ewell occupied on the Pike by vigorous attacks. At 5 o'clock Hancock advanced, drove back and broke up Hill's divisions, and or his right Wadsworth attacked their left rear. But after an hour's wood fighting the Union attack came to a standstill, and at this moment, the critical moment for the action of the IX. corps, Burnside was still more than a mile away, having scarcely passed through Warren's lines into the woods. Then Longstreet's corps, pushing its way in two columns of fours through Hill's retreating groups, attacked Hancock with the greatest fury, and forced him back some hundreds of yards. But the woods broke the force of this attack too, and by 7.30 the battle had become a stationary fire-fight.. After an interval in which both sides rallied their confused masses, Longstreet attacked again and gained more ground. Persistent rumours came into the Union headquarters of a Confederate advance against the Union left rear, and when Grant realized the situation he broke off one of Burnside's divisions from the IX. corps column and sent it to the cross roads as direct reserve to Hancock. At this moment the battle took a very unfavourable turn on the Plank Road. Longstreet had sent four brigades of infantry by a détour through the woods south of the Plank Road to attack Hancock's left. This was very effective, and the Union troops were hustled back to the cross-roads. But Longstreet, like Jackson a year before in these woods, was wounded by his own men at the critical moment and the battle again came to a standstill (2-2.30 P.M.).

Burnside's corps, arriving shortly before 10 A.M. near Chewn1 Wilson's division, in its movement on Shady Grove Church on the 5th, had been cut off by the enemy's advance on the Plank Road and attacked by some Confederate cavalry. But it extricated itself and joined Gregg, who had been sent to assist him, at Todd's Tavern.

635

ing's house, the position whence it was to have attacked Hill's
left in the early morning, was about to attack, in ignorance of
Hancock's repulse, when fortunately an order reached it to
suspend the advance and to make its way through the woods
towards Hancock's right. This dangerous flank march, screened
by the woods, was completed by 2 P.M., and General Burnside
began an attack upon the left of Longstreet's command (R. H.
Anderson's fresh division of Hill's corps). But Hancock being
in no condition to support the IX. corps, the whole attack was,
at 3 P.M., postponed by Grant's order. until 6 P.M. Thus there
was a long respite for both sides, varied only by a little skirmish-
ing. But Lee was determined, as always, to have the last word,
and about 4.15-4.30 a fierce assault was delivered amidst the
burning woods upon Hancock's entrenchments along the Brock
Road. For a moment, aided by the dense smoke, the Con-
federates seized and held the first line of works, but a counter-
stroke dislodged them. Burnside, though not expecting to have
to attack before 6, put into the fight such of his troops as were
ready, and at 5.30 or thereabouts the assaulting line receded into
the woods. Grant cancelled his order to attack at 6, and at
the decisive point the battle was at an end. But on the extreme
right of the Union army a sudden attack was delivered at sunset
upon the hitherto unmolested VI. corps, by Gordon, one of
Ewell's brigadiers. This carried off two generals and several
hundred prisoners, and a panic ensued which affected all the
Union forces on the Pike, and was not quieted until after
nightfall.

Lee, therefore, had the last word on both flanks, but in spite
of this and of the very heavy losses,2 Grant had already resolved
to go on, instead of going back like his various predecessors.
To him, indeed, the battle of the Wilderness was a victory, an
His scheme,
indecisive victory indeed, but one that had given him a moral
superiority which he did not intend to forfeit.
drafted carly on the morning of the 7th, was for the army to
march to Spottsylvania on the night of the 7th-8th, to assemble
there on the 8th, and thence to undertake a fresh manoeuvre
against Lee's right rear on the 9th. This movement required
the trains with the fighting line to be cleared away from the
roads needed for the troops at once, and Lee promptly discovered
that a movement was in progress. He mistook its object, however,
and assuming that Grant was falling back on Fredericksburg,
he prepared to shift his own forces to the south of that place
so as to bar the Richmond road. This led to a race for Spott-
sylvania, which was decided more by accidents to either side
than by the measures of the two commanding generals. On the
Union side Warren was to move to the line Spottsylvania Court
to take a roundabout route and to come in between the V. and
House-Todd's Tavern, followed by Hancock; Sedgwick was
II. corps; Burnside to follow Sedgwick. The cavalry was
ordered to watch the approaches towards the right of the army.
The movement began promptly after nightfall on the 7th. But
ere long the head of Warren's column, passing in rear of Han-
cock's line of battle, was blocked by the headquarters escort
of Grant and Meade. Next, the head of the V. corps was again
checked at Todd's Tavern by two cavalry divisions which had
been sent by Sheridan to regain the ground at Todd's Tavern,3
given up on the 6th, and after fighting the action of Todd's
Tavern had received no further orders from him. Meade,
greatly irritated, ordered Gregg's division out towards Corbin's
Bridge and Merritt's (Torbert's) to Spottsylvania. On the latter
road the Union cavalry found themselves opposed by Fitz Lee's
cavalry, and after some hours of disheartening work in the
woods, Merritt asked Warren to send forward infantry to drive
the enemy. This Warren did, although he was just preparing
to rest and to feed his men after their exhausting night-march.
Robinson's division at the head of the corps deployed and swiftly
drove in Fitz Lee. A little beyond Alsop's, however, Robinson
found his path barred by entrenched infantry. This was part

The Union losses in the battle were 18,000, the Confederates at least 11,500.

'In consequence of a mistaken order that the trains which he was protecting were to move forward to Piney Branch Church.