page_title: Jackson's Valley campaign
section_title: Cross Keys (June 8)
hierarchical_section_title: Jackson's Valley campaign / Valley campaign / Cross Keys (June 8)
caption_attribution_description: English: Sketch of the battle-field of Cross Keys, Va., June 8, 1862. ... Julius Bien &amp; Co., Lith., N.Y. (1891-1895)Author: United States. War Department
context_page_description: Jackson's Valley campaign, also known as the Shenandoah Valley campaign of 1862, was Confederate Maj. Gen. Thomas J. "Stonewall" Jackson's 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 in 48 days and won several minor battles as they successfully engaged three Union armies, preventing them from reinforcing the Union offensive against Richmond.
  Jackson suffered a tactical defeat at the First Battle of Kernstown against Col. Nathan Kimball, 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.
context_section_description: Frémont moved cautiously to approach Ewell's position on the morning of June 8, assuming that he was outnumbered, although he actually outnumbered the Confederates 11,500 to 5,800. (Richard Taylor's brigade was detached from Ewell's division for service with Jackson.) His men were held up by the determined skirmishers of the 15th Alabama Infantry for over an hour and he was unable to bring up his guns until 10 a.m. His opening artillery barrage was ineffective and did little more than alert Jackson at Port Republic that the battle had started. Frémont's men were arranged in a line running southwest to northeast on the Keezletown Road, facing Ewell's strong position about a mile south on a ridge behind Mill Creek, with both flanks anchored by dense woods. As they advanced, they wheeled left to become roughly parallel with the Confederate line. At about noon the Federal brigade on the left, commanded by Brig. Gen. Julius Stahel, chased a group of North Carolina skirmishers from Brig. Gen. Isaac R. Trimble's brigade across a clearing and up a hill, only to be surprised by a wave of musket fire. The 500 men of the 8th New York Infantry suffered nearly 50% casualties in the engagement.
  By mid-afternoon, Frémont had sent only five of his 24 regiments into battle and Ewell expected another attack. The impatient Trimble launched his own offensive against a Union battery, which took his brigade a mile in advance of the rest of Ewell's division. He and his men sat there for the rest of the afternoon, inviting an attack that never came. As Frémont withdrew his men back to the Keezletown Road, Ewell decided against a counterattack, knowing that his force was seriously outnumbered. Trimble proposed the idea of a night attack to both Ewell and Jackson, but neither general agreed. The Confederates merely advanced to the previous Union position, ending a battle that, considering the percentage of troops engaged, was little more than a skirmish. Union casualties were 684, Confederate only 288, although two of Ewell's brigade commanders, Brig. Gens. Arnold Elzey and George H. Steuart, were badly wounded.
  Stonewall Jackson's plan for June 9 was to concentrate his forces and overwhelm the outnumbered Shields at Port Republic. He rightly assumed that Frémont would be too shaken to launch a major attack and that he could be held at bay with a mere token force, so he ordered the majority of Ewell's division to withdraw under the cover of darkness. They slipped away from Frémont and crossed the North River bridge. A hastily constructed bridge across the South River allowed the Confederates to move into the foggy, flat bottomland below the south bank of the South Fork of the Shenandoah River. The Stonewall Brigade led the advance on the road to Conrad's Store, the direction from which Shields would be approaching. Also that morning, Jackson ordered his trains to begin a march into Brown's Gap.
caption: Sketch of the battle-field of Cross Keys, Va., June 8, 1862, Julius Bien & Co.
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