Game of the Week, January 5-11

The year's first Game of the Week takes us into the tangled Wilderness of Virginia in the spring of 1863, where one of the Civil War’s most daring and dramatic battles unfolded – Civil War Battles: Chancellorsville. Available at 25% off now through January 11th, this title lets players relive the Chancellorsville Campaign, including the bloody clashes at Fredericksburg and Chancellorsville, when a revitalized Union Army under Maj. Gen. Joseph Hooker squared off against Gen. Robert E. Lee’s Army of Northern Virginia.

By late 1862, Union hopes rested on new leadership after Antietam. President Lincoln first replaced the cautious McClellan with Ambrose Burnside – only for Burnside to meet a disastrous repulse at Fredericksburg in December 1862. The Union Army’s futile frontal assaults on Marye’s Heights cost over 12,000 casualties and shattered morale. Burnside’s failure at Fredericksburg prompted Lincoln to turn next to the brash Maj. Gen. Joseph “Fighting Joe” Hooker in early 1863. Hooker energetically reorganized and bolstered the Army of the Potomac, which he proclaimed “the finest army on the planet.” Confident in his superior numbers (roughly 130,000 Union soldiers to Lee’s roughly 60,000, as Longstreet’s corps was absent on other duty), Hooker devised an ambitious plan to trap Lee. “My plans are perfect,” Hooker boasted, “and when I start to carry them out, may God have mercy on General Lee, for I will have none.” In late April 1863, he sent cavalry to raid behind Lee and fixed a portion of Lee’s troops at Fredericksburg, while the bulk of his army crossed upriver to strike Lee’s left flank.

Lee, rather than retreat in the face of double his numbers, boldly divided his outnumbered army. On May 1, 1863, as Hooker’s columns advanced into the Chancellorsville area (a crossroads in dense woodland named "The Wilderness"), Lee struck first. Confused by the aggressive Confederate counter-move in the thickets of the Wilderness, Hooker suddenly lost his nerve and ordered his forces onto the defensive, ceding the initiative. Sensing an opportunity, Lee and his lieutenant, Lt. Gen. Thomas “Stonewall” Jackson, conceived one of the war’s most audacious maneuvers. On May 2, Jackson led roughly 28,000 men on a wide flanking march that secretly crossed in front of Hooker’s army and smashed into the Union right flank. That evening, Jackson’s troops burst out of the woods screaming the Rebel Yell, routing the Union XI Corps in a surprise attack that rolled the Federal line up for miles. The stunning assault achieved complete surprise – but at a great cost. As darkness fell, Jackson rode forward to scout for a potential night attack and was mistakenly fired upon by his own pickets. When Lee learned of Jackson’s injuries, he lamented, “He has lost his left arm, but I have lost my right.”

On May 3, with Jackson incapacitated, Lee pressed the attack. The third day’s fighting at Chancellorsville was ferocious – one of the bloodiest sustained combats of the war, with around 18,000 men killed or wounded in just a few hours that morning. Amid the chaos, Hooker himself was knocked senseless by the concussion of an artillery shell hitting a nearby pillar. Despite this, Union resistance continued; a separate Federal force under Maj. Gen. John Sedgwick even punched through the Confederate rearguard at Marye’s Heights in Fredericksburg, threatening Lee’s rear. In response, Lee divided his army yet again, dispatching troops to halt Sedgwick at Salem Church – another bold gamble that succeeded. By the end of May 3, Lee had driven back the Federals at Chancellorsville proper. Facing attacks from two sides, Hooker finally decided he’d had enough. On May 5–6, the Union Army retreated across the Rappahannock River, conceding the field to Lee.

Chancellorsville was a stunning Confederate victory against overwhelming odds. Lee’s audacious tactics and Hooker’s timidity had yielded an improbable win for the South. The week-long campaign inflicted about 30,000 casualties in total, making it one of the war’s costliest engagements. Despite the heavy bloodshed, the Battle of Chancellorsville is widely considered Lee’s greatest military victory. Southern morale soared; one Confederate diarist exulted that this triumph “throw[s] that of Fredericksburg in the shade,” given Hooker’s army “so cut to pieces by less than 60,000 half-starved ragamuffins.” For the North, the defeat was a bitter blow – President Lincoln, upon hearing of Hooker’s withdrawal, cried out, “My God! My God! What will the country say?”

Chancellorsville was the last time Lee won so decisively that it encouraged him to seize the strategic initiative. Buoyed by this success, he soon launched a second invasion of the North, leading to the fateful clash at Gettysburg two months later. Yet Chancellorsville’s legacy is bittersweet: it was the last victory of Stonewall Jackson, who died from his wounds, depriving Lee of his most trusted commander.

Just a year later, the tangled forests and river crossings of the Rappahannock–Rapidan region would again become the stage for decision—when Grant opened the Overland Campaign with the Wilderness and Spotsylvania battles fought only a short march from Chancellorsville. In that sense, Chancellorsville was not only a climax to the spring of 1863, but a grim preview of the grinding combat that would return to these same roads and thickets in 1864.

• Fredericksburg
• Chancellorsville
• Kelly’s Ford
• Marye’s Heights

Looking to dive deeper into the history? These books provide excellent background and battlefield insight:

Furgurson, Ernest B. Chancellorsville 1863: The Souls of the Brave. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1992

Sears, Stephen W. Chancellorsville. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1996

O’Reilly, Francis Augustin. The Fredericksburg Campaign: Winter War on the Rappahannock. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 2006

Mackowski, Chris, and Kristopher D. White. Chancellorsville’s Forgotten Front: The Battles of Second Fredericksburg and Salem Church, May 3, 1863. El Dorado Hills, CA: Savas Beatie, 2013

Below you find some historical video documentaries...

Screenshots

Last, but not least, below you find some screenshots of the game. As with the entire Civil War Battles series, this title has three 2D views and two 3D views to choose from. Then you have options to select from 2 different 2D icon sets, and finally, you can have either colorized or black & white unit and leader images. There are also some free alternative 3D maps that can be loaded from the Support page if you wish. 

Whether you’re a seasoned veteran of the series or exploring the Civil War for the first time, Campaign Chancellorsville offers one of the most thrilling and pivotal chapters of the Civil War — a perfect blend of strategic challenge and historical drama.

Available now at 25% off through January 11th.