14. In Virginia the first scenes of the year were enacted in the Shenandoah Valley. General Banks was sent forward with a strong division, and in the last of March occupied the town of Harrisonburg. To counteract this movement, Stonewall Jackson was sent with twenty thousand men to pass the Blue Ridge and cut off Banks's retreat. At Front Royal, the Confederates fell upon the Federals, routed them, and captured their guns and stores. Banks succeeded, however, in passing with his main division to Strasburg and escaping out of the valley. 15. Jackson now found himself in great peril, for General Fremont had been sent into the valley to intercept the Confederate retreat. But he succeeded in reaching Cross Keys before Fremont could attack him. The battle at Cross Keys was not decisive, and Jackson pressed on to Port Republic, where he attacked and defeated the division of General Shields. [Illustration: Vicinity of Richmond, 1862.] 16. On the 10th of March the Army of the Potomac set out from the camps about Washington to capture the Confederate capital. The advance proceeded as far as Manassas Junction, where McClellan, changing his plan, embarked a hundred and twenty thousand of his men for Fortress Monroe. From that place, on the 4th of April, the Union army advanced to Yorktown. This place was defended by ten thousand Confederates, under General Magruder; and here McClellan's advance was delayed for a month. On the 4th of May, Yorktown was taken and the Federal army pressed on to West Point. McClellan reached the Chickahominy without serious resistance, and crossed at Bottom's Bridge. [Sidenote: The Peninsular Campaign.] 17. On the 10th of May General Wool, the commandant of Fortress Monroe, led an expedition against Norfolk and captured the town. On the next day the Confederate iron-clad _Virginia_ was blown up to save her from capture. The James River was thus opened for the supply-transports of the Army of the Potomac. On the 31st of May that army was attacked at a place called Fair Oaks, or Seven Pines. Here for a part of two days the battle raged with great fury. At last the Confederates were driven back; but McClellan's victory was by no means decisive. General Joseph E. Johnston, the commander-in-chief of the Confederates, was severely wounded; and the command devolved on General Robert E. Lee. [Illustration: Robert E. Lee.]