Jackson's Division, Jackson's Command

On September 17, 1862, Jackson's Division, commanded at first by Brigadier General J.R. Jones, held the position it had taken the evening before and came under heavy artillery fire from light batteries in front and heavy guns beyond the Antietam, while its own batteries answered. When the Federal line advanced at 6 a.m. east of and on the Pike, Confederate skirmishers behind a rocky ledge 78 yards west of this point fired into the flank of Doubleday's Division, but were driven in after Gibbon's and Patrick's Brigades deployed west of the pike. Doubleday then advanced to and south of this point and engaged Grigsby's first line, the brigades of Winder and Jones, in an obstinate fight lasting more than half an hour before Grigsby fell back to a second line at the edge of the woods 380 yards south. Early in the action Jones was wounded and turned command over to Brigadier General W.E. Starke. After another half hour, Starke's second line advanced obliquing to the right and aligned along the fence bordering the pike to engage the Union advance east of it, but as its left reached the fence it was struck in flank and rear by Campbell's Battery and five regiments of Gibbon's and Patrick's Brigades behind the ledge, forcing the entire command back to the woods. Early in this movement Starke was killed, and command passed to Colonel Grigsby of the 27th Virginia Infantry. Grigsby reformed the division and, moving with Early's Brigade, turned the flank of Gibbon's and Patrick's line and compelled it to retire to Miller's Barn. Early halted in the angle of the West Woods a few yards south and west of this point, and Jackson's Division, reduced to 200 men, formed on his left facing the low ground west of the ledge and between it and the northern end of the West Woods, where it helped check the advance of Goodrich's Brigade of the Twelfth Corps before falling back to Alfred Poffenberger's 400 yards southwest of this point, where McLaw's Division relieved it.

Shepherdstown, Maryland · United States