Lee, Jackson, and Johnston had played the role of the
defender to perfection. No attempt had been made to hold the
frontier. Mobility and not earthwork was the weapon on which they had
relied. Richmond, the only fortress, had been used as a pivot of
operations, and not merely as a shelter for the army. The specious
expedient of pushing forward advanced guards to harass or delay the
enemy had been avoided; and thus no opportunity had been offered to
the invaders of dealing with the defence in detail, or of raising
their own morale by victory over isolated detachments. The generals
had declined battle until their forces were concentrated and the
enemy was divided. Nor had they fought except on ground of their own
choice. Johnston had refused to be drawn into decisive action until
McClellan became involved in the swamps of the Chickahominy. Jackson,
imitating like his superior the defensive strategy of Wellington and
Napoleon, had fallen back to a zone of manoeuvre south of the
Massanuttons. By retreating to the inaccessible fastness of Elk Run
Valley he had drawn Banks and Fremont up the Shenandoah, their lines
of communication growing longer and more vulnerable at every march,
and requiring daily more men to guard them.
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