The assault failed to break the Confederate line, but it did bend it back in several places. Grant believed that with a greater concentration a breakthrough could be achieved. Consequently, he ordered the II Corps under Gen. Winfield Hancock over to the left of the VI Corps, between it and the Chickahominy River, and planned an all out attack by the three corps for the morning of June 2.
Anticipating the move, Lee put A. P. Hill, supported by Gen. John Breckinridge’s division, over to his right between Anderson and the Chickahominy and waited.
The expected attack failed to materialize, however. Hancock got lost in the woods and swamps moving to his assigned position, and after an all-night forced march the men were too exhausted to mount an attack. Any chance the assault might have had for success was now gone. The delay was fortunate for Lee because Breckinridge also got lost and was not in position to support Hill on the morning of June 2. The attack was then ordered for that afternoon but again postponed until 4:30 the morning of June 5. And each corps commander received a telegram from Grant’s headquarters that read: “Corps Commanders will employ the interim in making examinations of the ground in their front and perfecting arrangements for the assault.”
Lee’s veterans took advantage of this fatal 24-hour delay to entrench themselves quickly and effectively, using every creek, gully, ravine, and swamp in such fashion that all approaches to their positions could be covered with a murderous fire. A newspaper reporter present at Cold Harbor wrote a vivid description of those entrenchments. “They are intricate, zig-zagged lines within lines, lines protecting flanks of lines, lines built to enfilade opposing lines * * * works within works and works outside works, each laid out with some definite design.”
Lee needed this strong position; he would fight at Cold Harbor without a reserve. He wrote to Jefferson Davis: “If I shorten my lines to provide a reserve, he will turn me; if I weaken my lines to provide a reserve, he will break them.”
Grant’s battle plan was relatively uncomplicated. It was, essentially, a simple, frontal assault. Hancock’s II Corps and Wright’s VI Corps, between the Chickahominy and the Cold Harbor road (now State Route 156), together with Smith’s XVIII Corps north of the road, were to attack all out and break the Confederate lines. Gen. Gouverneur Warren’s V Corps, north of the XVIII, was to be held in reserve, while Burnside’s IX Corps, on Grant’s extreme right, was not to enter the fight unless Lee weakened his line in that sector, then it would attack, supported by the V Corps. Lee did not weaken any part of his line, so these two corps were not engaged to any appreciable extent. Thus the battle actually took place on approximately a 2½-mile front, although the armies stretched for 6 miles from south to north, with the Union army facing west. Grant’s total strength was over 100,000 men, but less than 50,000 were actually engaged in the struggle.
Lee now had A. P. Hill, supported by Breckinridge, on his south flank next to the Chickahominy opposite Hancock and Wright. Hoke’s division straddled the Cold Harbor road with Gen. Joseph Kershaw’s division just north of Hoke, then Anderson and Gen. Richard Ewell’s corps. Lee’s total strength consisted of less than 60,000 men, but only about half were involved in the action of June 3.
It rained all night the night of June 2. Toward morning the heavy rain died to a soft, sticky mist that held the area in clammy fingers. The first gray streaks of dawn warned of the approach of a scorching sun that would turn the rain-soaked plain, with its myriad streams and swamps, into a steaming cauldron. Promptly at 4:30 the three corps jumped off to the attack, knowing nothing of the strength of the Confederate positions they would have to face. The corps commanders had ignored Grant’s telegraphed order of the previous afternoon and no proper reconnaissance was made.
The average soldier saw little in any battle in the Civil War, and even less at Cold Harbor because of the terrain. But as the first yellow rays of the sun shifted the gray mists, most of the Union soldiers could see the main line of Confederate entrenchments across the open spaces in front of them—a tracing of raw earth that had been turned up like a huge furrow, along a line of uneven ridges, looking empty but strangely ominous. Here and there bright regimental colors perched insolently on the dirt hills.
Suddenly, it seemed, the line was dotted with black slouch hats and glistening bayonets. Yellow sheets of flame flashed from end to end, then disappeared in a heavy cloud of smoke. Regiment after regiment exploded into action with a metallic roar. Gigantic crashes of artillery split the air. Shells screamed overhead like a pack of banshees, exploding in clouds of earth, horses, and men. The noise roared to a crescendo with a volume of sound that left the men dazed and confused. One veteran said it was more like a volcanic blast than a battle.