"I am, very respectfully, your obedient servant,
"J. B. GORDON.
"Hon. JEFFERSON DAVIS, Mississippi."
Immediately following, and perhaps in consequence of this sortie, an extensive attack was made upon our lines to the left of Fort Steadman, but without any decisive results. On the 27th of March the main part of Grant's forces confronting Richmond were moved over to the lines before Petersburg, and his left was on the same day joined by Sheridan's division of cavalry. It will be remembered that Lee had sent Longstreet to the north side of the James as soon as he discovered that Grant had sent a corps across with the supposed purpose of attacking Richmond from that side. It was intended that Longstreet should return whenever the enemy withdrew his main force from the north side of the James; but it appears that this was so secretly done as to conceal the fact from General Longstreet, and that both Hancock and Ord had joined Grant, to swell his forces by two corps before our troops returned to join Lee. Grant, thus strengthened, made a more determined movement to gain the right of Lee's position; before, however, he was ready to make his assault, Lee marched with a comparatively very small force, took the initiative, and on the 31st struck the enemy's advance, and repulsed him in great confusion, following until confronted by the heavy masses formed in open ground in the rear, when Lee withdrew his men back to their intrenchments.
A strategic position of recognized importance was that known as Five Forks. Lee had stationed there Major-General Pickett with his division, and some additional force. On the next day, the 1st of April, this position was assaulted, and our troops were driven from it in confusion. The unsettled question of time was now solved.
Grant's massive columns, advancing on right, left, and center, compelled our forces to retire to the inner line of defense, so that, on the morning of the 2d, the enemy was in a condition to besiege Petersburg in the true sense of that term. Battery Gregg made an obstinate defense, and, with a garrison of about two hundred and fifty men, held a corps in check for a large part of the day. The arrival of Longstreet's troops, and the strength of the shorter line now held by Lee, enabled him to make several attempts to dislodge his assailant from positions he had gained. In one of these, the distinguished soldier whose gallantry and good conduct it has frequently been my pleasure to notice, Lieutenant-General A. P. Hill, who had so often passed unscathed through storms of shot and shell, yielded up the life he had, in the beginning of the war, consecrated to the Confederate cause; and his comrades, while mourning his loss, have drawn consolation from the fact that he died before our flag was furled in defeat.
Retreat was now a present necessity. All that could be done was to hold the inner lines during the day, and make needful preparations to withdraw at night. In the forenoon of Sunday, the 2d, I received, when in church, a telegram announcing that the army would retire from Petersburg at night, and I went to my office to give needful directions for the evacuation of Richmond, the greatest difficulty of which was the withdrawal of the troops who were on the defenses east of the city, and along the James River.
The event had come before Lee had expected it, and the announcement was received by us in Richmond with sorrow and surprise; for, though it had been foreseen as a coming event which might possibly, though not probably, be averted, and such preparation as was practicable had been made to meet the contingency when it should occur, it was not believed to be so near at hand.
At nightfall our army commenced crossing the Appomattox, and, before dawn, was far on its way toward Amelia Court-House, Lee's purpose being, as previously agreed on in conference with me, to march to Danville, Virginia. By a reference to the map, it will be seen that General Grant, starting from the south side of the Appomattox, had a shorter line to Danville than that which General Lee must necessarily follow, and, if Grant directed his march so as to put his forces between Danville and those of Lee, it was quite possible for him to effect it. This was done, and thus Lee was prevented from carrying out his original purpose, and directed his march toward Lynchburg. The enemy, having first placed himself across the route to Danville, at Jetersville, subsequently took up the line of Lee's retreat. His large force of cavalry, and the exhausted condition of the horses of our small number of that arm, gave the pursuing foe a very great advantage; but, worn and reduced in numbers as Lee's army was, the spirit it had always shown flashed out whenever it was pressed. A division would turn upon a corps and drive it; and General Fitzhugh Lee, the worthy successor of the immortal Stuart, with a brigade of our emaciated cavalry, would drive a division of their pursuers. These scenes were repeatedly enacted during the long march from Petersburg to Appomattox Court-House, and have been so vividly and fully described by others that I will pass to the closing event.
Lee had never contemplated surrender. He had, long before, in language similar to that employed by Washington during the Revolution, expressed to me the belief that in the mountains of Virginia he could carry on the war for twenty years, and, in directing his march toward Lynchburg, it may well be that as an alternative he hoped to reach those mountains, and, with the advantage which the topography would give, yet to baffle the hosts which were following him. On the evening of the 8th General Lee decided, after conference with his corps commanders, that he would advance the next morning beyond Appomattox Court-House, and, if the force reported to be there should prove to be only Sheridan's cavalry, to disperse it and continue the march toward Lynchburg; but, if infantry should be found in large force, the attempt to break through it was not to be made, and the correspondence which General Grant had initiated on the previous day should be reopened by a flag, with propositions for an interview to arrange the terms of capitulation. Gordon, whose corps formed the rear-guard from Petersburg, and who had fought daily for the protection of the trains, had now been transferred to the front. On the next morning, before daylight, Lee sent Colonel Venable, one of his staff, to Gordon, commanding the advance, to learn his opinion as to the chances of a successful attack, to which Gordon replied, "My old corps is reduced to a frazzle, and, unless I am supported by Longstreet heavily, I do not think we can do anything more." When Colonel Venable returned with this answer to General Lee, he said, "Then there is nothing left me but to go and see General Grant."