I
proposed to leave troops enough where I was, to occupy the enemy there,
and throw the rest of my force down the river, and re-enforce Sedgwick;
then the whole of Lee's army, except that which had been left in front
of Sedgwick, would be thrown off the road to Richmond, and my army would
be on it.
"As soon as I heard that Gen. Sedgwick had re-crossed the river, seeing
no object in maintaining my position where I was, and believing it would
be more to my advantage to hazard an engagement with the enemy at
Franklin's Crossing, where I had elbow-room, than where I was, the army
on the right was directed to re-cross the river, and did so on the night
between the 5th and 6th of May."
Now, the Franklin's Crossing plan, or its equivalent, had been tried by
Burnside, in December, with a loss of twelve thousand men; and it had
been fully canvassed and condemned as impracticable, before beginning
the Chancellorsville manoeuvre. To resuscitate it can therefore serve
no purpose but as an idle excuse. And the argument of elbow-room,
if made, is the one Hooker should have used against withdrawing from the
open country he had reached, to the Wilderness, on Friday, May 1.
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