Between 1861 and 1865, Americans made war on each other in great numbers. As with any civil conflict, the war was marked with many decisive battles. One such battle was the Second Battle of Bull Run, also known as The Second Battle of Manassas. .
The Second Battle of Bull Run took place between August28 and August 30, 1862 in Virginia. Stonewall Jackson led 25,000 men on a fifty-six mile march around John Pope's right flank. Jackson wanted to get Pope's rail line to Washington and loot his supply depot at Manassas Junction.
General Jackson seemed to disappear. It took them two days for Pope to find him. He was dug in on Stony Ridge, overlooking the same Bull Run battlefield where he had helped defeat the Union Army the year before.
Announcing that he would now "bag the whole crowd," Pope attacked Jackson on August 29. The Confederates held, their men throwing rocks when their ammunition ran low. Their commander confident they would win. .
Pope was convinced the battered rebels would now flee, and promised to get them the next day. Meanwhile, the other wing of Lee's army had arrived, and at two in the afternoon Major General James Longstreet sent five divisions storming into the Union flank along a two-mile front.
Twenty-five thousand men were killed, wounded, or missing at Second Bull Run. This was five times the number that horrified the Country the first time the North and South fought there.
The Second Bull Run Battle was the most decisive battle of the Northern Virginia Campaign. Only an effective Union rearguard action prevented a replay of the First Manassas disaster.
