A Special Camp Christmas

T’was two days before Christmas and all through the Confederate Second Corps headquarters the staff was astir. The invitations had been sent and the replies confirmed. Preparations began in earnest, all under the direction of Capt. James Power Smith, Gen. Jackson’s assistant adjutant general. He was checking his list and checking it twice. Stonewall Jackson’s headquarters’ floors were swept and the room decorated, with a festive table set for dinner. Stonewall Jackson decided to celebrate Christmas by hosting a dinner party. He had told his staff that he wished to entertain generals Lee, Stuart, and Pendleton, and their staffs for dinner on Christmas Day.[1]

Robert E. Lee’s Army of Northern Virginia had confronted the Union Army of the Potomac after it crossed the Rappahannock River at Fredericksburg on December 13, 1862. The resulting battle was a resounding defeat for the Northerners, and Ambrose Burnside re-crossed his army and took up the pontoons. Now, facing one another across the flowing waters, a quiet fell over both armies, as both settled into winter quarters. General Lee, who had written early Christmas Day to his daughter Mildred about this year’s Christmas, said, “At least Genl. Burnside & his army will not eat . . . Xmas dinner in Richmond.”[2]

Stonewall’s headquarters was located at Moss Neck. It was a once prospering 1,600-acre plantation eleven miles downriver from Fredericksburg and one mile from the river. On the grounds was a brick, Greek Revival-styled mansion. The building, measuring 250 feet from wing to wing, was trimmed with teak and mahogany and decorated like an English manor. Richard Corbin, the owner of Moss Neck, was a trooper in the 9th Virginia Cavalry, but his 27-year-old wife Roberta (Bertie) occupied the house along with her 5-year-old daughter, Jane Wellford Corbin (“Janie”), and Richard’s two sisters, 23-year-old Catherine (”Kate”) Corbin and 24-year-old Netty Corbin Dickinson and her children Jane and Gardiner.

When Roberta Corbin offered the use of her house for his headquarters, Stonewall declined, instead agreeing to use an outbuilding that the family used as an office that stood 130 feet from the house. The Moss Neck office had three rooms. The entrance opened into a small vestibule. On the right side as you entered were stairs leading up a half-story where there was a second floor bedroom. To the entry way’s left was a wood closet for fuel to heat the premises. As you walked straight, another door opened to the office. On either side of the door were bookcases containing horse and cattle records, agricultural reports, a set of Virginia statues, and a miscellaneous lot of old books.

Two of the walls each had a window, and the fourth wall held a fireplace. The walls were adorned with “pictures of thoroughbred horses, prized bulls, a cockfight, and a terrier famous for the number of rats he could kill in a minute.” Jackson would use the office to conduct business. The general placed a writing table on one side of the fireplace, while on the other he placed a cot, where sometimes he slept. His headquarters’ Sibley tent, and those tents of his staff, were pitched nearby next to the stables.[3]

Now with only two days to prepare, Capt. Smith frantically scoured the countryside, buying and begging for foodstuffs for the party. When he attempted to buy a turkey from a local lady and told her of his purpose, she gladly presented him with two turkeys gratis. A bucket of oysters was procured from the nearby Rappahannock River. The ladies of Staunton, Virginia sent a box containing another turkey, a splendid ham, a cake, a bottle of wine, biscuits and a jar of pickles. He was able to garner a number of other delicacies from generous donors.[4]

Christmas Day dawned a beautiful day. The weather was unseasonably warm, almost spring-like. That morning Jackson worked on his reports and took time out to pen a Christmas letter to his wife in Winchester. He was visited by Lt. Henry Kyd Douglas of his staff. Douglas came to pay his respects and wish the general a Merry Christmas. Douglas couldn’t help but notice the decorations for the party. Jackson had previously invited him to attend the dinner and extended a second invitation, but Kyd Douglas again politely declined as he had other plans. As party time neared, Jackson donned a new uniform coat that J.E.B. Stuart had ordered for him from a Richmond tailor. Stuart’s aide, Heros von Borcke, had delivered it to Stonewall two days before. Jackson was surprised and thought that the uniform was too elegant for him to wear, but Borcke insisted he try it on as Stuart wanted to be sure it fit. Embarrassed, Jackson did as requested, and the coat fit like a glove.[5]

In the meantime, under the direction of James Power Smith, Jackson’s personal servant and cook, Jim, was busy in Mrs. Corbin’s kitchen preparing the feast. When all was prepared, the food was brought to the table set up in Jackson’s office. Jim had even baked biscuits and Mrs. Corbin provided fresh butter. Jim and another servant by the name of John would wait on the table dressed in their best and wearing white aprons.

The guests soon arrived. The light of massed candles flickered over the men in the dining room. There was Gen. Lee accompanied by his staff members, Col. Charles Venable and Col. Charles Marshall. J.E.B. Stuart arrived “in great glee” with clanking of saber and spurs, his black plume in his hat dancing as he walked. Accompanying him was Capt. John Esten Cooke, Maj. Heros von Borcke, and his artillery commander, Maj. John Pelham. Besides Stonewall and Smith, from the Second Corps, came Reverend General William Nelson Pendleton, with his staff officer 1st Lt.  George Peterkin.  Capt. Sandie Pendleton, Jackson’s chief of staff, and Dr. Hunter McGuire were also in attendance. The final guest was the newest member of Jackson’s staff, Lt. Col. Charles James Faulkner who was at Moss Neck to help Jackson and Sandie Pendleton with the writing of Stonewall’s delinquent battle reports. All told there were 14 officers gaily talking and exchanging jokes.[6]

Admiring the festooned room, the abundance of food before him, and the splendor of Jackson’s new uniform, Lee was struck with how out of character this all was for Jackson’s usual Spartan lifestyle. He lightheartedly said that he thought Jackson and his staff were only playing soldiers and invited him to dine with him and “see how a soldier ought to live.”

Stuart began to walk around the room admiring the sporty paintings. He couldn’t resist teasing his beloved friend. “Gentlemen,” said Stuart, “we ought to have them make a drawing of this interior, the picture to be labeled view of the winter quarters of Stonewall Jackson, affording an insight into the tastes and character of the individual.” One historian wrote, “Stuart pretended that Jackson had picked out all the art himself. At the hearth he paused with affected horror to study the picture of the killer terrier, saying that he wished to express his astonishment and grief at Jackson’s low taste in art, and that it would be a sad disappointment to old ladies of the country, who thought that Jackson was a good man.” This made Stonewall blush and stammer apologies as his guests stifle their laughter. But Stuart wasn’t through. He commented on the highbrow white aproned waiters and feigned shock at seeing wine on the table, teasing the tee totaling general.

Then Stuart spotted the butter on the table. Mrs. Corbin had used a stamp to imprint a rooster on the large mold of butter. “This must be his coat of arms! If there is not crowning evidence of our host’s sporting tastes,” roared Stuart, pointing to a picture of a gamecock on the wall and then pointing at the butter, “He even puts his favorite gamecock on his butter!” Jackson grinned and blushed through it all, and even Lee laughed boisterously.[7]

With everyone seated, the Reverend General William Pendleton said grace and the officers enjoyed their Christmas feast. The evening was filled with more joking and laughter. Through it all Jackson seemed well pleased. When his dinner party was over and all the officers had left, Old Jack returned to his tent to work on his reports. All the young staff officers, along with those members that were not invited to Jackson soiree, joined the women in the Corbin mansion for more food, drinks, and holiday fun. It was a Merry Christmas to all and to all at Moss Neck a good night.

[1] Stonewall Jackson and Chancellorsville; pp. 4-7

[2] Guelzo, Allen C., Robert E. Lee: A Life, New York, Alfred A. Knopf, 2021, p. 277. REL to MCL, Dec. 25, 1862.

[3] Robertson, James, I.,Jr., Stonewall Jackson: The Man, the Soldier, the Legend,  New York, MacMillan Publishing, 1997, pp. 667-668. Gwyne, S.C., Rebel Yell: The Violence, Passion, and Redemption of Stonewall Jackson, New York, Scribner, 2014, p.508

[4] Stonewall Jackson and Chancellorsville;  pp. 4-7

[5] Douglas, Henry Kyd, I Rode With Stonewall: Being chiefly the War Experiences of the Youngest Member of Jackson’s Staff from the John Brown raid to the Hanging of Mrs. Surratt, Greenwich, Connecticut, Fawcett Publications, 1961, pp. 203-204. Krick, Robert K., Civil War Weather in Virginia, Tuscaloosa, Alabama, The University of Alabama Press, 2007, pp. 79-80 Robertson, Stonewall Jackson, p. 630

[6] Stonewall Jackson and Chancellorsville;  pp. 6-7. Bean, W.G., Stonewall’s Man: Sandie Pendleton, Chapel Hill, North Carolina, The University of North Carolina Press, 1959, pp. 101-103

[7] Thomason, John W., JEB Stuart, New York, Charles Scribner’s sons, 1930, pp. 346-347.  Robertson, Stonewall Jackson, p. 669. Gwyne, Rebel Yell, p. 509