The second, and far more serious, problem was that by placing sixty-five thousand Confederate troops—six of his ten divisions—north of the Chickahominy, Lee had at most twenty-five thousand troops under Generals John Magruder and Benjamin Huger to defend the city. He was not only leaving a token force to defend the Confederate capital—an almost crazy risk all by itself—he was also planning to deploy the bulk of his army on the far side of a swollen river, from which point it would be difficult or impossible to come to Richmond’s aid. It was the inverse of the tactical dilemma Lee intended to
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