The capture of Ewell and his generals, with the larger part of the forces under them, and the dispersion of the remainder of Ewell's wing of Lee's army were irreparable disasters to the Confederacy. Lee could no longer hope to cope with the pursuing army. The Sixth Corps had the distinguished honor of striking the decisive blows at Petersburg on the 2d, and at Sailor's Creek on the 6th of April, 1865.
Sailor's Creek may fairly be called the last field battle of the war. A distinguished Confederate General, Wade Hampton, in a Century Magazine article, pronounced the battle of Bentonville, North Carolina, the "last important one of the war, . . . the last general battle of the Civil War." There may be room for controversy as to where and when the last "general battle" of the war was fought. Certain it is that it was not at Bentonville that the conflict ended on a large scale and blood ceased to flow in the great Rebellion. Bentonville was mainly fought March 19, 1865, and while it may properly be called a field engagement and of no insignificant proportions, it was not the last one. This is not the place to enter into any controversy about last battles, their character and significance, yet it may not be out of place to call attention to the most prominent battles, etc., fought after March 19, 1865.
Fort Stedman, in front of Petersburg, Virginia, was assaulted and temporarily taken by the Confederate General Gordon, March 25, 1865, and while the fighting which ensued in retaking the fort and in driving out the attacking forces may not be denominated a general battle, yet it was a bloody one. Other severe fighting took place in front of Petersburg the same day.
Five Forks, Virginia, fought by General Sheridan's cavalry and the Fifth Corps, Army of the Potomac, April 1, 1865, was fought outside of fortifications by cavalry, infantry, and artillery combined, and there were charges and counter-charges, lasting several hours, the losses being heavy in killed and wounded. Many prisoners were there taken by Sheridan's command. Five Forks was a general field engagement.
The assaults and conflicts on, over, and around the ramparts of the forts and fortifications (incomparably bloody) in front of Petersburg, Virginia, April 2, 1865, which tore open the strong lines of defence held by General Lee's army, forced it to flight, and lost Petersburg and Richmond to the Confederacy, may not be entitled to be classed as general field battles.
Sailor's Creek came next in order, fought April 6, 1865.
The assault and capture of Fort Blakely, near Mobile, Alabama, took place April 9, 1865. If Blakely can be called a general battle it was the last one of the war. It was, however, mainly an assault by the Union forces under General E. R. S. Canby on fortifications, though rich in results. The killed and wounded at Blakely in both armies aggregated about 2000 men. Canby's forces captured 3423 men, 40 pieces of artillery, 16 battle flags, etc. The prize fought for and won was Mobile, its surrounding forts and the Confederate Navy in the harbor of Mobile.
At Palmetto Ranche, Texas, on May 13, 1865, near the battle-field of General Zachary Taylor at Palo Alto (May 8, 1846), the first of the Mexican War, and about two thousand miles from Big Bethel, the scene, June 10, 1861, of the first considerable battle of the Rebellion, a lively engagement took place, hardly, however, rising above the dignity of a skirmish or an affair, though it was by no means bloodless. (The magnitude of the battles of the Rebellion dwarfed to affairs or skirmishes what were formerly in this and other countries called battles.)
Colonel Theodore H. Barrett commanded the Union forces at Palmetto
Ranche, and General J. E. Slaughter the Confederates.
The 62d United States Colored Infantry, in this fight, probably fired the last angry volley of the war, and Sergeant Crocket of that regiment (three days after Jefferson Davis' capture) received the last wound from a rebel hostile bullet, and hence shed the last fresh blood in the war resulting in the freedom of his race in the United States. The observation irresistibly comes, that on the scene of the first battle of the Mexican War—a war inaugurated for the acquisition of slave territory—and of the first battle participated in by Lieutenant-General (then Second Lieutenant) U. S. Grant, almost exactly nineteen years later, the last conflict took place in the war for the preservation of the Union, and in which slavery was totally overthrown in our Republic.