Scenes I’d Like to Have Seen: Stonewall in a Tree

In December 1861, Gen. Stonewall Jackson, after his unsuccessful attempt to destroy Dam Number 5 on the Potomac River, retreated back to Winchester. “As he left the river, he eyed a persimmon tree loaded with fruit. Jackson loved fruit of any kind, and the persimmon was one of his favorites. The fruit is harvested in the late fall after the first deep frost, which causes the fruit to fully ripen and sweeten. Before this time, the persimmon is too astringent to eat.

On this late December day, the tree Jackson found was laden with the gooey, sweet fruit. To the amusement of his staff, the general climbed up the tree and began to eat. He climbed higher to reach more. Once he had his fill, he realized that he was stuck amongst the branches of the tree, unable to descend, and had to call for assistance from his staff. Jackson was never known as a graceful or athletic man. He had big feet and was rather awkward in his movements, which contributed to his predicament. To extricate him from the boughs of the tree, his staff officers, ‘convulsed with laughter,’ procured two fence rails and leaned them up into the tree. Jackson shifted his weight over onto the rails and slid to earth.”

Sources:

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, Premier Civil War Classics, Fawcett Publications, Inc., Greenwich, Conn., 1961, p. 19.

Snyder, Timothy R., Stonewall Jackson’s Winter Operations: The Raids Against the C&O Canal and the Bath-Romney Campaign, December 1861 to February 1862, Savas Beatie, El Dorado Hills, CA., 2026, pp. 99-100.