Background
After the Battle of Brandy Station, June 9, 1863, Confederate General Robert E. Lee ordered Ewell's 19,000-man Second Corps, Army of Northern Virginia, to clear the lower Shenandoah Valley of Union opposition so that Lee's army could proceed on its invasion of Pennsylvania, shielded by the Blue Ridge Mountains from Union interference.
General-in-chief Henry Wager Halleck expressed great concerns about the Middle Department's defensive strategy for its primary objective of protecting the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad corridor. Brig. Gen. Benjamin Franklin Kelley, commander of the "railroad division" (Department of Harper's Ferry), had been advised that his plan along with Maj. Gen. Milroy's and Maj. Gen. Robert C. Schenck's (Commander of the Middle Department) was unsound:
Headquarters Eighth Army Corps,
Baltimore, January 5, 1863.
The following telegram was received to-day from Major-General Halleck, General-in-Chief:
"Major-General Schenck: No attempt should be made to hold Winchester against a large force of the enemy ..."
General Halleck does not quite agree with General Schenck and yourself as to the policy of covering and protecting the road principly by keeping up advanced posts at Leesburg, Winchester and Romney.
— WM. D. WHIPPLE, Assistant Adjutant-General.
Read more about this topic: Second Battle Of Winchester
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