CHAPTER XXXVI.
THE ADVANCE ON PETERSBURG.
ADVANCE ON PETERSBURG—GENERAL BUTLER'S MOVEMENT—BEAUREGARD'S COUNTER-MOVEMENT—ADVANCE FORCES UNDER GENERAL SMITH—HANCOCK'S ATTACK—CUTTING OFF THE RAILROADS—THE FIGHT AT WELDON ROAD—BURNSIDE'S MINE—EXPLOSION AND THE SLAUGHTER AT THE CRATER—FIGHTING AT DEEP BOTTOM—THE CONSTRUCTION OF AN ARMY RAILROAD—SIEGE OF PETERSBURG BEGUN.
It had been a part of Grant's plan, in opening the campaign of 1864, that Gen. B. F. Butler, with a force that was called the Army of the James, should march against Richmond and Petersburg. He moved promptly, at the same time with the armies led by Grant and Sherman, embarking his forces on transports at Fort Monroe, and first making a feint of steaming up York River. In the night the vessel turned back and steamed up the James. Early the next day, May 6th, the troops were landed at City Point, at the junction of the James and the Appomattox, and intrenchments were thrown up. Detachments were sent out to cut the railroads south of Petersburg, and between that city and Richmond; but no effective work was done. General Butler was ordered to secure a position as far up the James as possible, and advanced to Drury's Bluff, where he was attacked by a force under General Beauregard and driven back to Bermuda Hundred. At the point where the curves of the James and the Appomattox bring those two streams within less than three miles of each other, Butler threw up a line of intrenchments, with his right resting on the James at Dutch Gap, and his left on the Appomattox at Point of Rocks. The position was very strong, and it would be hopeless for the Confederates to assault it. The disadvantage was, that Beauregard had only to throw up a parallel line of intrenchments across the same neck of land, and Butler could not advance a step. What he had secured, however, was afterward valuable as a protection for City Point, when Grant swung the Army of the Potomac across the James, which became thenceforth the landing-place for supplies.
Grant had reinforced Butler with troops under Gen. William F. Smith, and planned to have an immediate advance on Petersburg while the Army of the Potomac was crossing the James (June 14, 1864). The work was intrusted to Smith, who was to get close to the Confederate intrenchments in the night, and carry them at daybreak. He unexpectedly came upon the enemy fortified between City Point and Petersburg, and had a fight in which he was successful, but it caused a loss of precious time. Grant hurried Hancock's troops over the river, to follow Smith. But this corps was delayed several hours waiting for rations, and finally went on without them. It appears that Hancock's instructions were defective, and he did not know that he was expected to take Petersburg till he received a note from Smith urging him to hurry forward. Smith spent nearly the whole of the 15th in reconnoitring the defences of Petersburg, which were but lightly manned, and in the evening carried a portion of them by assault, the work being done by colored troops under Gen. Edward W. Hincks. In the morning of the 16th Hancock's men captured a small additional portion of the works; but here that general had to be relieved for ten days, because of the breaking out of the grievous wound that he had received at Gettysburg. Gen. David B. Birney succeeded him in the command of the corps. General Meade came upon the ground, ordered another assault, and carried another portion. But by this time Beauregard had thrown more men into the fortifications, and the fighting was stubborn and bloody. It was continued through the 17th, with no apparent result, except that at night the Confederates fell back to an inner line, and in the morning the National line was correspondingly advanced. In these preliminary operations against Petersburg, the National loss was nearly ten thousand men. There is no official statement of the Confederate loss, but the indications were that it was about the same.
| CITY POINT—A FEDERAL SUPPLY STATION. |
When Lee found where Grant was going, he moved east and south of Richmond, crossing the James at Drury's Bluff, and presently confronting his enemy in the trenches east and south of Petersburg. The country is well adapted for defence, and the works were extensive and very strong. Seeing that the city itself could not be immediately captured, Grant endeavored to sever its important communications. The Norfolk Railroad was easily cut off; and the Army of the Potomac, which for some time had hardly known any difference between day and night, was allowed a few days of rest and comparative quiet. But the most important line was the Weldon Railroad, which brought up Confederate supplies from the South, and Grant and Meade made an early attempt to seize it. On the 21st and 22d Birney's corps was pushed to the left, extending south of the city, while Wright's was sent by a route further south to strike directly at the railroad. Wright came into a position nearly at right angles with Birney, facing west toward the railroad, while Birney faced north toward the city. They were not in connection, however, and did not sufficiently guard their flanks. A heavy Confederate force under Gen. A. P. Hill, coming out to meet the movement, drove straight into the gap, turned the left flank of the Second Corps, threw it into confusion, and captured seventeen hundred men and four guns. The fighting was not severe; but the movement against the railroad was arrested. Hill withdrew to his intrenchments in the evening, the Second Corps reëstablished its line, and the Sixth intrenched itself in a position facing the railroad and about a mile and a half from it. On this flank, affairs remained substantially in this condition till the middle of August.
But meanwhile something that promised great results was going on near the centre of the line, in front of Burnside's corps. A regiment composed largely of Pennsylvania miners dug a tunnel under the nearest point of the Confederate works. These works consisted of forts or redans at intervals, with connecting lines of rifle-pits, and the tunnel was directed under one of the forts. The digging was begun in a ravine, to be out of sight of the enemy, and the earth was carried out in barrows made of cracker-boxes, and hidden under brushwood. The Confederates learned what was being done, and the location of the tunnel, but did not succeed in striking it by countermining. They came to have vague and exaggerated fears of it, and many people in Petersburg believed that the whole city was undermined. The work occupied nearly a month, and when finished it consisted of a straight tunnel five hundred feet long, ending in a cross-gallery seventy feet long. In this gallery was placed eight thousand pounds of powder, with slow-matches. The day fixed for the explosion was the 30th of July. To distract attention from it, and diminish if possible the force that held the lines immediately around Petersburg, Hancock was sent across the James at Deep Bottom, where an intrenched camp was held by a force under Gen. John G. Foster, to make a feint against the works north of the river. This had the desired effect, as Lee, anxious for the safety of Richmond, hurried a large part of his army across at Drury's Bluff to confront Hancock. With this exception, the arrangements for the enterprise were all bad. The explosion of the mine alone would do little or no good; but it was expected to make such a breach in the enemy's line that a strong column could be thrust through and take the works in reverse. For such a task the best of troops are required; but Burnside's corps was by no means the best in the army, and the choice of a division to lead, being determined by lot, fell upon Gen. James H. Ledlie's, which was probably the worst, and certainly the worst commanded. Furthermore, the obstructions were not properly cleared away to permit the rapid deployment of a large force between the lines.
A few minutes before five o'clock in the morning, the mine was exploded. A vast mass of earth, surrounded by smoke, with the flames of burning powder playing through it, rose two hundred feet into the air, seemed to poise there for a moment, and then fell. The fort with its guns and garrison—about three hundred men of a South Carolina regiment—was completely destroyed, and in place of it was a crater about thirty feet deep and nearly two hundred feet long. At the same moment the heavy batteries in the National line opened upon the enemy, to protect the assaulting column from artillery fire. Ledlie's division pushed forward into the crater, and there stopped. General Ledlie himself did not accompany the men, and there seemed to be no one to direct them. Thirty golden minutes passed, during which the Confederates, who had run away in terror from the neighboring intrenchments, made no effort to drive out the assailants. At the end of that they began to rally to their guns, and presently directed a heavy fire upon the men in the crater. Burnside tried to remedy the difficulty by pushing out more troops, and at length sent his black division, which charged through the crater and up the slope beyond, but was there met by a fire before which it recoiled; for the Confederates had constructed an inner line of breastworks commanding the front along which the explosion had been expected. Finally, both musketry and artillery were concentrated upon the disorganized mass of troops huddled in the crater, while shells were lighted and rolled down its sloping sides, till those who were left alive scrambled out and got away as best they could. This affair cost the National army about four thousand men—many of them prisoners—while the Confederate loss was hardly a thousand. Soon after this General Burnside was relieved, at his own request, and the command of his corps was given to Gen. John G. Parke. General Grant had never had much faith in the success of the mine, and had given only a reluctant consent to the experiment. Perhaps this was because he had witnessed two similar ones at Vicksburg, both of which were failures. He could hardly escape the criticism, however, that it was his duty either to forbid it altogether or to give it every element of success, including especially a competent leader for the assault.
On the 13th of August, Hancock made another and more serious demonstration from Deep Bottom toward Richmond. He assaulted the defences of the city, and fighting was kept up for several days. He gained nothing, for Lee threw a strong force into the intrenchments and repelled his attacks. But there was great gain at the other end of the line; for Grant took advantage of the weakening of Lee's right to seize the Weldon Railroad. Warren's corps was moved out to the road on the 18th, took a position across it at a point about four miles from Petersburg, and intrenched. On the 19th, and again on the 21st, Lee made determined attacks on this position, but was repelled with heavy loss. Warren clung to his line, and made such dispositions as at length enabled him to meet any assault with but little loss to himself. A day or two later, Hancock returned from the north side of the James, and was rapidly marched to the extreme left, to pass beyond Warren and destroy some miles of the Weldon Railroad. He tore up the track and completely disabled it to a point three miles south of Reams Station, and on the 25th sent out Gibbon's division to the work some miles farther. But the approach of a heavy Confederate force under Gen. A. P. Hill caused it to fall back to Reams Station, where with Miles's division (six thousand men in all) and two thousand cavalry it held a line of intrenchments. Three assaults upon this line were repelled, with bloody loss to the Confederates. General Hill then ordered Heth's division to make another assault and carry the works at all hazards. Heth found a place from which a part of the National line could be enfiladed by artillery, and after a brisk bombardment assaulted, carried the works, and captured three batteries. Miles's men were rallied, retook a part of the line and one of the batteries, and formed a new line, which they held, assisted by the dismounted cavalry, who poured an effective fire into the flank of the advancing Confederates. At night both sides withdrew from the field. Hancock had lost twenty-four hundred men, seventeen hundred of whom were prisoners. The Confederate loss is unknown, but it was severe.
| EXPLOSION OF THE MINE BEFORE PETERSBURG. |
| GLOBE TAVERN, GENERAL WARREN'S HEADQUARTERS AT PETERSBURG. |
From that time Grant held possession of the Weldon Railroad, and whatever supplies came to the Confederate army by that route had to be hauled thirty miles in wagons. The National army constructed for its own use a railroad in the rear of and parallel with its long line of intrenchments, running from City Point to the extreme left flank. This road was not particular about grades and curves, but simply followed the natural contour of the ground. Then began what is called the siege of Petersburg, which was not a siege in the proper sense of the word, because the Confederate communications were open; but the military preparations and processes were identical with those known as siege operations, and every possible appliance, mechanical or military, that could assist in the work was brought here.