Not far from Villard and Washburne, Congressman Ely had likewise strolled down the road for a better look. When he had gone about 100 yards, a bullet struck the ground near him. The congressman dodged out of the road and found refuge with some others behind a tree, frozen, as he admitted, from fear of being shot if I moved. How long he remained there, he was unable to say. But it must have been nearly an hour–long enough for the situation around him to change dramatically.

Subscribe Today

• Did you enjoy our article?
• Read more in Civil War Times magazine
• Subscribe online and save nearly 40%!!!
 

About 5:30 p.m., Ely spotted a line of Confederate infantry emerging from a nearby wood. Two officers approached Ely and asked who he was.

Alfred Ely.

What state are you from? asked the officers.

From the state of New York, replied Ely.

Are you connected in any way with the Government? prodded the soldiers.

A Representative in Congress, answered Ely.

One of the officers grabbed Ely by the arm, stripped him of a pistol, and proclaimed him a prisoner. The two officers hustled Ely to their commander, Colonel E.B. Cash of the 8th South Carolina. When they announced the identity of their prisoner, Cash–a cantankerous old farmer who would fight one of the last lawful duels in America after the war–pointed his pistol at Ely’s head.

God damn your white-livered soul! screeched Cash. I’ll blow your brains out on the spot!

The junior officers quickly interceded: Colonel, Colonel, you must not shoot that pistol, he is our prisoner. Still enraged, Cash grudgingly stashed his pistol, and the South Carolinians hustled Ely to the rear. He would spend the next six months in a Richmond prison, a political prize tormented all the while by his captors. (Once released, Ely would do the thoroughly American thing and write a best-selling book about his ordeal.)

Atop the ridge, the remaining civilians sensed that the predicted triumph across Bull Run had unraveled. Soon, Confederate cavalry charged up the hill, cutting off Charles McCook–visiting his father yet again–from his regiment. The elder McCook watched in horror as his son fled along a fence line with a Confederate officer on horseback chasing him. Charles kept him most manfully at bay with his bayonet, wrote Judge McCook a few days later. The Confederate demanded the young McCook’s surrender. No, never; no, never to a rebel, Charles declared. The horseman circled around McCook and shot him in the back, and someone in turn shot the Confederate officer. Judge McCook gathered up the mangled body of his wounded son, placed him on a makeshift bed in his carriage, and started a mournful ride back toward Centreville. Charles McCook would die within hours.

The knot of dignitaries and reporters on the ridge overlooking Bull Run soon found themselves caught in the swirl of retreat. Washburne started rearward in his carriage, only to come across a wounded soldier. The congressman nobly gave up his seat to the man and started walking. Just moments later, he turned to witness an unnerving sight. I beheld a perfect avalanche pouring down the road immediately behind me, he wrote. It was the retreat of the army…. A perfect panic had seized every body. The soldiers threw away their guns and their blankets…. Officers, I blush to say, were running with their men.

London Times correspondent Russell arrived at Cub Run, an offshoot of Bull Run that intersects Warrenton Turnpike a few miles closer to Centreville, just in time to see the disaster unfold. His account would do more to shape the public–and historical–perception of the Union defeat than anyone else’s, and it was not a flattering narrative: The scene on the [Warrenton] road had now assumed an aspect which has not a parallel in any description I have ever read. Infantry soldiers on mules and draught horses…. Negro servants on their masters’ wagons; ambulances crowded with unwounded soldiers; wagons swarming with men who threw out the contents in the road to make room, grinding through a shouting, screaming mass of men on foot, who were literally yelling with rage…. There was nothing left… but to go with the current one could not stem.

Help HistoryNet by bookmarking to