The Second Battle of Bull Run was fought between August 28 and 30, 1862 as part of the American Civil War. It was the culmination of an offensive campaign waged by Confederate General Robert E. Lee’s Army of Northern Virginia against Union Major General John Pope’s Army of Virginia. It was a battle of much larger scale and numbers than the First Battle of Bull Run fought in 1861 on the same ground.
Confederate Major General Thomas J. “Stonewall” Jackson captured the Union supply depot at Manassas Junction following a wide-ranging flanking march and threatening Pope’s line of communications with Washington, D.C. Jackson took up defensive positions of Stony Ridge. On August 28, 1862, Jackson attacked a Union column at Brawner’s Farm resulting in a stalemate. The wing of Lee’s army commanded by Major General James Longstreet broke through light Union resistance in the Battle of Thoroughfare Gap and approached the battlefield.
Pope became convinced that he had trapped Jackson and concentrated the bulk of his army against him. On August 29, Pope launched a series of assaults against Jackson’s position and they were repulsed with heavy casualties on both sides. On August 30, Pope renewed his attacks and massed Confederate artillery devastated a Union assault.
