Siege of Petersburg.—Violent Assault upon our Position.—A Cavalry
Expedition.—Contest near Ream's Station.—The City invested with
Earthworks.—Position of the Forces.—The Mine exploded, and an
Assault made.—Attacks on our Lines.—Object of the Enemy.—Our
Strength.—Assault on Fort Fisher.—Evacuation of Wilmington.—
Purpose of Grant's Campaign.—Lee's Conference with the
President.—Plans.—Sortie against Fort Steadman.—Movements of
Grant farther to Lee's right.—Army retires from Petersburg.—The
Capitulation.—Letters of Lee.
After the battle of Cold Harbor, the geography of the country no longer enabled General Grant, by a flank movement to his left, to keep himself covered by a stream, and yet draw nearer to his objective point, Richmond. He had now reached the Chickahominy, and to move down the east bank of that stream would be to depart further from the prize he sought, the capital of the Confederacy. His overland march had cost him the loss of more men than Lee's army contained at the beginning of the campaign. He now, from considerations which may fairly be assumed to have been the result of his many unsuccessful assaults on Lee's army, or from other considerations which I am not in a position to suggest, decided to seek a new base on the James River, and to attempt the capture of our capital by a movement from the south. With this view, on the night of June 12th he commenced a movement by the lower crossings of the Chickahominy toward the James River. General Lee learned of the withdrawal on the next morning, and moved to our pontoon-bridge above Drury's Bluff. While Grant's army was making this march to James River, General Smith, with his division, which had arrived at Bermuda Hundred, was, on the night of the 14th, directed to move against Petersburg, with an additional force of two divisions, it being supposed that this column would be sufficient to effect what General Butler's previous attempts had utterly failed to accomplish, the capture of Petersburg and the destruction of the Southern Railroad. On the morning of the 15th the attack was made, the exterior redoubts and rifle-pits were carried, and the column advanced toward the inner works, but the artillery was used so effectively as to impress the commander of the assailants with the idea that there must be a large supporting force of infantry, and the attack was suspended so as to allow the columns in rear to come up.
Hancock's corps was on the south side of the James River, before the attack on Petersburg commenced, and was ordered to move forward, but not informed that an attack was to be made, nor directed to march to Petersburg until late in the afternoon, when he received orders to move to the aid of General Smith. It being night when the junction was made, it was deemed prudent to wait until morning. Had they known how feeble was the garrison, it is probable that Petersburg would have been captured that night; but with the morning came another change, as marked as that from darkness to light. Lee crossed the James River on the 15th, and by a night march his advance was in the entrenchments of Petersburg before the morning for which the enemy was waiting. The artillery now had other support than the old men and boys of the town.
The Confederates promptly seized the commanding points and rapidly strengthened their lines, so that the morning's reconnaissance indicated to the enemy the propriety of postponing an attack until all his force should arrive.
On the 17th an assault was made with such spirit and force as to gain a part of our line, in which, however, the assailants suffered severely. Lee had now constructed a line in rear of the one first occupied, having such advantages as gave to our army much greater power to resist. On the morning of the 18th Grant ordered a general assault, but finding that the former line had been evacuated, and a new one on more commanding ground had been constructed, the assault was postponed until the afternoon; then attacks were made by heavy columns on various parts of our line, with some partial success, but the final result was failure everywhere, and with extraordinary sacrifice of life.
With his usual persistence, he had made attack after attack, and for the resulting carnage had no gain to compensate. The eagerness manifested leads to the supposition that it was expected to capture the place while Lee with part of his force was guarding against an advance on Richmond by the river road. The four days' experience seems to have convinced Grant of the impolicy of assault, for thereafter he commenced to lay siege to the place. On the 21st a heavy force of the enemy was advanced more to our right, in the vicinity of the Weldon Railroad, which runs southward from Petersburg. But General Lee, observing an interval between the left of the Second and right of the Sixth of the enemy's corps, sent forward a column under General A. P. Hill, which, entering the interval, poured a fire into the flank of one corps on the right and the other on the left, doubling their flank divisions up on their center, and driving them with disorder and with heavy loss. Several entire regiments, a battery, and many standards were captured, when Hill, having checked the advance which was directed against the Weldon Railroad, withdrew with his captures to his former position, bringing with him the guns and nearly three thousand prisoners.
On the same night, a cavalry expedition, consisting of the divisions of Generals Wilson and Kautz, numbering about six thousand men, was sent west to cut the Weldon, Southside, and Danville Railroads, which connected our army with the south and west. This raid resulted in important injury to our communications. The enemy's cavalry tore up large distances of the tracks of all three of the railroads, burning the wood-work and laying waste the country around. But they were pursued and harassed by a small body of cavalry under General W. H. F. Lee, and, on their return near Ream's Station, were met, near Sapponey Church, by a force of fifteen hundred cavalry under General Hampton. That officer at once attacked. The fighting continued fiercely throughout the night, and at dawn the enemy's cavalry retreated in confusion. Near Ream's Station, at which point they attempted to cross the Weldon Railroad, they were met by General Fitzhugh Lee's horsemen and a body of infantry under General Mahone, and the force completed their discomfiture. After a brief attempt to force their way, they broke in disorder, leaving behind them twelve pieces of artillery, and more than a thousand prisoners, and many wagons and ambulances. The railroads were soon repaired, and the enemy's cavalry was for the time rendered unfit for service.
Every attempt made to force General Lee's lines having proved unsuccessful, General Grant determined upon the method of slow approaches, and proceeded to confront the city with a line of earthworks, and, by gradually extending the line to his left, he hoped to reach out toward the Weldon and Southside Railroads. To obtain possession of these roads now became the special object with him, and all his movements had regard to that end. Petersburg is twenty-two miles south of Richmond, and is connected with the south and west by the Weldon and Southside Railroads, the latter of which crosses the Danville Railroad, the main line of communication between Richmond and the Gulf States. With the enemy once holding these roads and those north of the city, Richmond would be isolated, and it would have been necessary for the Confederate army to evacuate eastern Virginia.
It will be seen from what has been written that, though the operations against Petersburg have been ordinarily called a siege, it could not in strictness of language be so denominated, as the communications in the rear, as well as to the north and south, were still open. It was really a conflict between opposing intrenchments.
General Grant had crossed a force into Charles City, on the north bank of the James, and thus menaced Richmond with an assault from that quarter. His line extended thence across the neck of the peninsula of Bermuda Hundred, and east and south of Petersburg, where it gradually stretched westward, approaching nearer and nearer to the railroads bringing the supplies for our army and for Richmond. The line of General Lee conformed to that of General Grant. In addition to the works east and southeast of Richmond, an exterior line of defense had been constructed against the hostile forces at Deep Bottom, and, in addition to a fortification of some strength at Drury's Bluff, obstructions were placed in the river to prevent the ascent of the Federal gunboats. The lines thence continued facing those of the enemy north of the Appomattox, and, crossing that stream, extended around the city of Petersburg, gradually moving westward with the works of the enemy. The struggle that ensued consisted chiefly of attempts to break through our lines. These it is not my purpose to notice seriatim; some of them, however, it is thought necessary to mention. While at Petersburg, the assaults of the enemy were met by a resistance sufficient to repel his most vigorous attacks; our force confronting Deep Bottom was known to be so small as to suggest an attempt to capture Richmond by a movement on the north side of the James. On the 26th of July a corps of infantry was sent over to Deep Bottom to move against our pontoon-bridges near to Drury's Bluff, so as to prevent Lee from sending reënforcements to the north side of the James, while Sheridan with his cavalry moved to the north side of Richmond to attack the works which, being poorly garrisoned, it was thought might be taken by assault. Lee, discovering the movement after the enemy had gained some partial success, sent over reënforcements, which drove him back and defeated the expedition. On the night of the 28th the infantry corps (Hancock's) was secretly withdrawn from the north side of the river, to coöperate in the grand assault which Grant was preparing to make upon Lee's intrenchments. The uniform failure, as has been stated, of the assaults upon our lines had caused the conclusion that they could only succeed after a breach had been made in the works. For that purpose a subterranean gallery for a mine was run under one of our forts. General Burnside, who conducted the operation, thus describes the work: