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Jackson's Valley Campaign was Confederate Maj. Gen. Thomas J. "Stonewall" Jackson's famous spring 1862 campaign through the Shenandoah Valley in Virginia during the American Civil War. Employing audacity and rapid, unpredictable movements on interior lines, Jackson's 17,000 men marched 646 miles (1,040 km) in 48 days and won several minor battles as they successfully engaged three Union armies (52,000 men), preventing them from reinforcing the Union offensive against Richmond.〔Historians differ in their classification of Jackson's campaign. Some, such as Peter Cozzens in ''Shenandoah 1862'', include Jackson's campaign against Romney, West Virginia (the Romney Expedition). Others, such as Hattaway and Jones in ''How the North Won'', or Robert K. Krick (Gallagher, p. 24), classify it as a one-month campaign that begins at the Battle of McDowell on May 8, omitting Jackson's loss at Kernstown in March. The National Park Service's (Civil War Sites Advisory Commission ) (and Kennedy's ''Civil War Battlefield Guide'', which is based on the CWSAC work) includes the battles from Kernstown to Port Republic, but also adds the Battle of Princeton Court House, which happened during the same time period, but involved neither Jackson nor the Shenandoah Valley. The focus of this article is on Jackson's operations in the Valley that influenced the Lincoln Administration to challenge him with forces that could have been used by Maj. Gen. George B. McClellan's Peninsula Campaign against Richmond.〕 Jackson suffered a defeat (his sole defeat of the war) at the First Battle of Kernstown (March 23, 1862) against Col. Nathan Kimball (part of Union Maj. Gen. Nathaniel P. Banks's army), but it proved to be a strategic Confederate victory because President Abraham Lincoln reinforced the Union's Valley forces with troops that had originally been designated for the Peninsula Campaign against Richmond. On May 8, after more than a month of skirmishing with Banks, Jackson moved deceptively to the west of the Valley and drove back elements of Maj. Gen. John C. Frémont's army in the Battle of McDowell, preventing a potential combination of the two Union armies against him. Jackson then headed down the Valley once again to confront Banks. Concealing his movement in the Luray Valley, Jackson joined forces with Maj. Gen. Richard S. Ewell and captured the Federal garrison at Front Royal on May 23, causing Banks to retreat to the north. On May 25, in the First Battle of Winchester, Jackson defeated Banks and pursued him until the Union Army crossed the Potomac River into Maryland. Bringing in Union reinforcements from eastern Virginia, Brig. Gen. James Shields recaptured Front Royal and planned to link up with Frémont in Strasburg. Jackson was now threatened by three small Union armies. Withdrawing up the Valley from Winchester, Jackson was pursued by Frémont and Shields. On June 8, Ewell defeated Frémont in the Battle of Cross Keys and on the following day, crossed the North River to join forces with Jackson to defeat Shields in the Battle of Port Republic, bringing the campaign to a close. Jackson followed up his successful campaign by forced marches to join Gen. Robert E. Lee for the Seven Days Battles outside Richmond. His audacious campaign elevated him to the position of the most famous general in the Confederacy (until this reputation was later supplanted by Lee) and has been studied ever since by military organizations around the world. ==Background== In the spring of 1862 "Southern morale... was at its nadir"〔Cozzens, p. 4.: "Greater arguably than the strategic value of Jackson's victories in the Shenandoah Valley was the boost they gave to Southern morale, which in the spring of 1862 was at its nadir." Gallagher, p. x.〕 and "prospects for the Confederacy's survival seemed bleak."〔McPherson, p. 454.〕 Following the successful summer of 1861, particularly the First Battle of Bull Run (First Manassas), its prospects declined quickly. Union armies in the Western Theater, under Ulysses S. Grant and others, captured Southern territory and won significant battles at Fort Donelson and Shiloh. And in the East, Maj. Gen. George B. McClellan's massive Army of the Potomac was approaching Richmond from the southeast in the Peninsula Campaign, Maj. Gen. Irvin McDowell's large corps was poised to hit Richmond from the north, and Maj. Gen. Nathaniel P. Banks's army was threatening the Shenandoah Valley. However, Jackson's Confederate troops were in "excellent spirits,"〔Henderson, p. 162.〕 laying the foundation for his performance in the Valley that spring, which helped derail the Union plans and re-energize Confederate morale elsewhere.〔Cozzens, p. 4.〕 During the Civil War, the Shenandoah Valley was one of the most strategic geographic features of Virginia. The watershed of the Shenandoah River passed between the Blue Ridge Mountains on the east and the Allegheny Mountains to the west, extending 140 miles southwest from the Potomac River at Shepherdstown and Harpers Ferry, at an average width of 25 miles. By the conventions of local residents, the "upper Valley" referred to the southwestern end, which had a generally higher elevation than the lower Valley to the northeast. Moving "up the Valley" meant traveling southwest, for instance. Between the North and South Forks of the Shenandoah River, Massanutten Mountain soared 2,900 feet and separated the Valley into two halves for about 50 miles, from Strasburg to Harrisonburg. During the 19th century, there was but a single road that crossed over the mountain, from New Market to Luray. The Valley offered two strategic advantages to the Confederates. First, a Northern army invading Virginia could be subjected to Confederate flanking attacks pouring through the many wind gaps across the Blue Ridge. Second, the Valley offered a protected avenue that allowed Confederate armies to head north into Pennsylvania unimpeded; this was the route taken by Gen. Robert E. Lee to invade the North in the Gettysburg Campaign of 1863 and by Lt. Gen. Jubal A. Early in the Valley Campaigns of 1864. In contrast, the orientation of the Valley offered little advantage to a Northern army headed toward Richmond. But denying the Valley to the Confederacy would be a significant blow. It was an agriculturally rich area—the 2.5 million bushels of wheat produced in 1860, for example, accounted for about 19% of the crop in the entire state and the Valley was also rich in livestock—that was used to provision Virginia's armies and the Confederate capital of Richmond. If the Federals could reach Staunton in the upper Valley, they would threaten the vital Virginia and Tennessee Railroad, which ran from Richmond to the Mississippi River. Stonewall Jackson wrote to a staff member, "If this Valley is lost, Virginia is lost." In addition to Jackson's campaign in 1862, the Valley was subjected to conflict for virtually the entire war, most notably in the Valley Campaigns of 1864.〔Cozzens, pp. 20–21, 37–38; Gallagher, pp. xiii, 87; Eicher, p. 208; Clark, pp. 21, 84.〕 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Jackson's Valley Campaign」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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