"Of all wars, those between races which had been accustomed to stand to each other in the relation of master and slave have been so much the most horrible that by general consent the exciting of a servile insurrection has been considered as beyond the pale of legitimate warfare. This had been held even in the case of European serfdom, although there the rulers and the ruled are of the same blood, religion and language. But the conflict between the white men and the negro, and particularly the American white man and the American negro, is likely to be more ruthless than any which the ancient world, fruitful in such histories, or the modern records of Algeria can furnish. There was reason to hope that the deeds of 1857 in India would not be paralleled in our time or in any after age. The Asiatic savagery rose upon a dominant race scattered throughout the land, and wreaked its vengeance upon it by atrocities which it would be a relief to forget. But it has been reserved for the New World to present the spectacle of civil war, calling servile war to its aid, and of men of English race and language so envenomed against each other that one party places arms in the hands of the half savage negro, and the other acts as if resolved to give no quarter to the insurgent race or the white man who commands them or fights by their side. In the valley of the Mississippi, where these negro soldiers are in actual service, it seems likely that a story as revolting as that of St. Domingo is being prepared for the world. No one who reads the description of the fighting at Port Hudson, and the accounts given by the papers of scenes at other places, can help fearing that the worst part of this war has yet to come, and that a people who lately boasted that they took the lead in education and material civilization are now carrying on a contest without regard to any law of conventional warfare,—one side training negroes to fight against its own white flesh and blood, the other slaughtering them without mercy whenever they find them in the field.
" * * * It is pitiable to find these unhappy Africans, whose clumsy frames are no match for the sinewy and agile white American, thus led on to be destroyed by a merciless enemy. Should the war proceed in this manner, it is possible that the massacre of Africans may not be confined to actual conflict in the field. Hitherto the whites have been sufficiently confident in the negroes to leave them unmolested, even when the enemy was near; but with two or three black regiments in each federal corps, and such events as the Port Hudson massacre occuring to infuriate the minds on either side, who can foresee what three months more of war may bring forth?
"All that we can say with certainty is that the unhappy negro will be the chief sufferer in this unequal conflict. An even greater calamity, however, is the brutalization of two antagonistic peoples by the introduction into the war of these servile allies of the federals. Already there are military murders and executions on both sides. The horrors which Europe has foreseen for a year past are now upon us. Reprisal will provoke reprisal, until all men's natures are hardened, and the land flows with blood."
The article is truly instructive to the present generation; its malignity and misrepresentation of the Administration's intentions in regard to the arming of negroes, serves to illustrate the deep-seated animosity which then existed in England toward the union of the States. Nor will the American negro ever forget England's advice to the confederates, whose massacre of negro soldiers fighting for freedom she endorsed and applauded. The descendants of those black soldiers, who were engaged in the prolonged struggle for freedom, can rejoice in the fact that no single act of those patriots is in keeping with the Englishman's prediction; no taint of brutality is even charged against them by those whom they took prisoners in battle. The confederates themselves testify to the humane treatment they unexpectedly received at the hands of their negro captors. Mr. Pollard, the historian, says:
"No servile insurrections had taken place in the South."
But it is gratifying to know that all Englishmen did not agree with the writer of the Times. A London letter in the New York Evening Post, said:
"Mr. Spurgeon makes most effective and touching prayers, remembering, at least once on a Sunday, the United States. 'Grant, O God,' he said recently, 'that the right may conquer, and that if the fearful canker of slavery must be cut out by the sword, it be wholly eradicated from the body politic of which it is the curse.' He is seldom, however, as pointed as this; and, like other clergymen of England, prays for the return of peace. Indeed, it must be acknowledged that if the English press and government have done what they could to continue this war, the dissenting clergy of England have nobly shown their good will and hearty sympathy with the Americans, and their sincere desire for the settlement of our difficulties. 'If praying would do you Americans any good,' said an irreverent acquaintance last Sunday, 'you will be gratified to learn that a force of a thousand-clergymen-power is constantly at work for you over here.'"
After the heroic and bloody effort at Cold Harbor to reach Richmond, or to cross the James above the confederate capitol, and thus cut off the enemy's supplies,—after Grant had flanked, until to flank again would be to leave Richmond in his rear,—when Lee had withdrawn to his fortifications, refusing to accept Grant's challenge to come out and fight a decisive battle,—when all hope of accomplishing either of these objects had vanished, Grant determined to return to his original plan of attack from the coast, and turned his face toward the James river. On the 12th of June the Army of the Potomac began to move, and by the 16th it was, with all its trains across, and on the south side of the James.
Petersburg Grant regarded as the citadel of Richmond, and to capture it was the first thing on his list to be accomplished. General Butler was made acquainted with this, and as soon as General Smith, who, with a portion of Butler's forces had been temporarily dispatched to join the army of the Potomac at Cold Harbor, returned to Bermuda Hundreds with his force, he was ordered forward to capture the Cockade City. It was midnight on the 14th, when Smith's troops arrived. Butler ordered him immediately forward against Petersburg, and he moved accordingly. His force was in three divisions of Infantry, and one of Cavalry, under General Kautz, who was to threaten the line of works on the Norfolk road. General Hinks, with his division of the Phalanx, was to take position across the Jordon's Point road on the right of Kautz; Brooks' division of white troops was to follow, Hinks coming in at the center of the line, while General Martindale with the other division was to move along the Appomattox and strike the City Point road. Smith's movement was directed against the northeast side of Petersburg, extending from the City Point to the Norfolk railroad. About daylight on the 15th, as the columns advanced on the City Point road at Bailey's farm, six miles from Petersburg, a confederate battery opened fire. Kautz reconnoitered and found a line of rifle trench, extending along the front, on rapidly rising ground, with a thicket covering. The work was held by a regiment of cavalry and a light battery. At once there was use for the Phalanx; the works must be captured with the battery before the troops could proceed. The cavalry was re-called, and Hinks began the formation of an attacking party from his division. The confederates were in an open field, their battery upon a knoll in the same field, commanding a sweeping position to its approaches. The advancing troops must come out from the woods, rush up the slope and carry it at the point of the bayonet, exposed to the tempest of musketry and cannister of the battery. Hinks formed his line for the assault, and the word of command was given,—"forward." The line emerged from the woods, the enemy opened with cannister upon the steadily advancing column, which, without stopping, replied with a volley of Minie bullets.
"The long, dusky line, arm to arm, knee to knee."