The 37th was further weakened when Company B was detailed to guard an ammunition wagon and ambulance. Colonel Lee was once again placed in charge of two regiments, his diminished 37th and the 18th. Advancing through some woods, the 37th encountered the Federals, according to a 37th officer, concealed behind logs, trees and in the cut of the road way which [was] bordered by a fence…. The Federal force was vastly superior to the 37th, but the same officer recalled that Coln Lees men stood like victorious officers & men stood as firm as rocks within 15 or 20 paces of the Yankee line. Volley after volley of grape from their cannon & Minie Balls from there Infantry Mowed Down our men…. After a vicious fight, the bulk of Porter’s corps arrived and the Confederates retreated, leaving many of their dead and wounded. The 37th suffered 26 killed, 61 wounded and 167 captured, about one in three men engaged that day.

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Even while the battle raged north of Richmond, Branch’s brigade was being assigned to a newly created division under the leadership of Maj. Gen. Ambrose Powell Hill. In a letter to Branch, A.P. Hill described his command as the Light Division, and the 37th would spend the rest of the war as a member of that famous organization.

The regiment rendered good service during the Seven Days’ battles. At Mechanicsville, it acted as a liaison betweenthe newly named Army of Northern Virginia, under General Robert E. Lee, and the tardy Maj. Gen. Thomas J. Stonewall Jackson. At Gaines’ Mill, the regiment charged the Federal works several times before the Yankees retreated from their position. On June 30 at Frayser’s Farm, the 37th was once again engaged. As Colonel Lee yelled On, my brave boys! he was mortally wounded by an artillery shell. When told of his death, the men of the 37th wept. William Barbour assumed command of the regiment and was promoted to full colonel on July 1.

The 37th next fought in the August Battles of Cedar Mountain and Second Manassas. After participating in the capture of Harpers Ferry, the regiment and the rest of Hill’s Light Division made the exhausting and critical march from there to the Sharpsburg battlefield. The 37th then took part in Hill’s famous counterattack that stopped the Federal IX Corps’ drive toward the rear of Lee’s army. Toward the end of the fighting, Branch was raising his field glasses to his eyes when a Federal bullet ended his life. Colonel James H. Lane of the 28th then assumed command of the brigade and was promoted to brigadier general.

At the Battle of Fredericksburg, the 37th was on the left of a gap in the line created by a swamp at the base of Prospect Hill when the Federals were able to push through the gap. Colonel Barbour reacted by refusing his three right companies and fighting fiercely until his troops ran out of ammunition and were forced to retreat.

On May 2, 1863, the 37th participated in Jackson’s famous flank march at Chancellorsville. The regiment was at the front that evening as Jackson reconnoitered the Federal position beyond the lines. And the 37th would fire the first shots of the infamous volley that rippled down the line to its left and mortally wounded Jackson. The next day, the 37th suffered the most casualties of any regiment engaged in the battle when its troops assaulted Federal entrenchments west of the Chancellor house. Barbour later called it the bloodiest battle that I have ever witnessed.

The rest of the regiment would soon trade their smoothbores for Enfield and Springfield rifle-muskets. The 37th’s troops put their new weapons to good use in the Gettysburg campaign. They drove elements of the Federal cavalry off the field on July 1, and fought again on July 3 in support of Brig. Gen. James J. Pettigrew’s division during the grand assault commonly known as Pickett’s Charge. After Gettysburg, the 37th fell back to Virginia, later fighting at Kelly’s Ford and Mine Run.

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