Slavery and four years of war

by Joseph Warren Keifer

At the earliest dawn of the 8th, the Sixth Corps pushed after Lee, compelling him to abandon some of his heaviest artillery and a further part of his trains. Longstreet covered Lee's rear, and his troops had not been seriously engaged on the retreat. Ord and the Fifth Corps struggled westward, cutting off all chance of Lee turning southward and of thus extricating himself. The 8th was not a day of battles but of the utmost activity in both armies.

I note an incident. While halted, about noon on the 8th, in some low pines to drink a cup of coffee and eat a cracker, Colonel Horace Kellogg, of the 123d Ohio, who had been captured with Washburn's command on the 6th, near High Bridge, came to us through the bushes from a hiding-place to which he escaped soon after his capture. He looked cadaverous, was wild-eyed, and in a crazed condition, caused by starvation and want of water for two days. We had to restrain him, and give him water, coffee, and food in small quantities at first, to prevent his killing himself from over-indulgence.

Sheridan, who had concentrated his cavalry at Prospect Station under Crook, Merritt, and Custer, at daybreak of the 8th hastened westward, south of Lee, to Appomattox Station. Sergeant White, of the scouts, in advance, in disguise, west of the Station, met four trains from Lynchburg with supplies sent in obedience to the Burkeville dispatch already mentioned. The trains were feeling their way eastward, in ignorance of Lee's whereabouts. The Sergeant had the original dispatch with him, and exhibited it, and, by dwelling on the starving condition of Lee's army, easily persuaded the officers in charge to run the trains east of Appomattox Station, he having, meantime, sent word to Sheridan where they could be found. Custer hastened forward, sending two regiments by a détour, in a gallop, to seize and break the railroad behind the trains. The trains were captured. One was burned, and the other three sent eastward towards Farmville. This capture took place just as the head of Lee's column came in sight.(20) Custer attacked Lee's advance, and was soon joined by Devin's division and a brigade from Crook. Together they drove it back, capturing twenty-five pieces of artillery, a hospital train, and a large park of wagons which were being sent ahead of Lee's main army. Sheridan's headquarters, at night, were at a farm-house, just south of Appomattox Station, and about three miles southwest of the Court-House of that name. Neither he nor his command slept that night. Sheridan was now across Lee's front, and if he could hold on, Lee must surrender. Ord, with the Fifth Corps following, was hastening to Sheridan. The supreme hour was at hand. Ord was no laggard, and it was known that he would put forth all human effort, yet Sheridan dispatched through the night officer after staff officer to apprise Ord of the immediate danger the cavalry was in, if unsupported, and to assure him that his presence with his column would end the Rebellion. Before day-dawn the cavalry was in the saddle, in battle array, bearing down on the Confederate advance, then at the Court-House. Ord arrived in person before sun-up of the 9th, and hastily consulted Sheridan where to put in his troops on their arrival. Ord then returned to hurry on his weary, hungry, foot-sore men, who had marched all the night, having little sleep for many days. Sheridan turned from the consultation with Ord to take charge of the battle already raging near the Court-House.

Let us look within the lines of the Confederate Army and see what was transpiring there. That army had, since Sailor's Creek and Farmville, been directed, of necessity, along the north of the river on Appomattox Court-House and Lynchburg. It had been assailed, night and day, flank and rear, from the time it left Petersburg. Provisions were scarce, and many of its best officers had, in the last week, fallen or been captured. It, however, had held out bravely and with more spirit than would be expected. It was an old and once splendidly organized and equipped army, and its discipline had been good. Pendleton and others of Lee's generals (not including Longstreet) secretly, on the 7th, held a council, and with a view of lightening Lee's responsibilities, decided to inform him that they thought the time had come to surrender his army. The next day Longstreet was requested to bear the report of this council to Lee. He declined, and Pendleton made to report to Lee himself. The latter, if correctly reported, said: "I trust it has not come to that," adding, among other things, "If I were to say a word to the Federal commander, he would regard it as such a confession of weakness as to make it the condition of demanding an unconditional surrender."(21)

Gordon, with Fitz Lee at the head of the cavalry, commanded the advance, and Longstreet the rear. The night of the 8th found Lee's advance at Appomattox Court-House forced well back, and Longstreet's rear pressed close on his main body. General Lee called in council, at a late hour that night, Lieutenant-General James Longstreet, Major-Generals John B. Gordon, Fitzhugh Lee, and Wm. N. Pendleton.(22) This was the last council of war of the Army of Northern Virginia, if it could be called one. The meeting was in a secluded spot, in a gloomy pine woods, without shelter. The night was damp and chilly, and there was a small, smoky, green-pine fire, affording little light. The whole surrounding was calculated to dispirit the five officers, to say nothing of the occasion. Little was said or done. Lee made some inquiry as to the position of the troops. At the end of an hour the council broke up, Lee directing Gordon to mass his command, including all the cavalry under Fitz Lee and General Long's batteries of thirty guns, and move through Appomattox Court-House, where the advance rested, and to commence the movement at 1 A.M. The trains were to follow closely, covered by Longstreet's corps, which was still Lee's rear-guard. Sheridan's cavalry was to be overwhelmed, and, with this done, the retreat was to continue on to Lynchburg. At 3 in the morning General Lee rode slowly forward apparently to join his van-guard in the effort to break through our lines. Not, however, until 5 A.M. of the 9th did Gordon and Fitz Lee get in motion against Sheridan's cavalry, which they then found spread over a wide front near Appomattox Court-House. The battle commenced, the Union cavalry sullenly falling back. This inspired new hope in the Confederate Army. General Mumford, with a portion of his Confederate cavalry division, found a break in Sheridan's line, and charging through, escaped. This gave rise to a report that the road had been opened.(23)

Gordon pushed on with renewed confidence, infantry, cavalry, and artillery, first striking Crook and McKenzie on the Union left, then Merritt in the centre, the latter two yielding as though defeated. Crook, however, held firmly on the extreme left, while Merritt drew from the centre to the right, there to unite Custer and Devin's cavalry divisions, leaving the centre apparently abandoned. Gordon hastily dispatched word of his success, and, inspired with a hope of complete victory, hurled his hosts into the great gap thus made, capturing two pieces of artillery, and moved forward to the crest of a ridge. But, alas! From this crest Gordon and his officers saw a new scene. They beheld through the mists and the morning gray, on the plain before them, Ord's column, formed and forming, in full array, ready for strong battle. Hope vanished from the minds of the Confederate generals. The Fifth Corps, under General Charles Griffin, was also then arriving on Ord's extreme right in support of the cavalry already there. The cavalry in the centre had been but a curtain. Gordon halted and sent word of the situation to his chief, notifying him that further effort was hopeless, and would cause a useless sacrifice; that he had "fought his troops to a frazzle."(24)

Ord was Sheridan's superior in rank, but both decided to end matters at once, so, with battle flags and guidons bent to the front, the combined forces advanced to their work. Some artillery shots passed through their lines, but did not arrest them. The Confederates retired to another ridge immediately fronting the Court-House. Gordon there displayed a white flag, indicating a willingness to negotiate. Custer first saw it. He notified Sheridan, who notified Ord, and the attack was suspended. Sheridan galloped to the front, though fired on by soldiers of a South Carolina brigade,(25) and soon joined Gordon. A truce looking to a surrender was made. Colonel J. W. Forsyth of Sheridan's staff passed through the Confederate Army to Meade, and notified him of the truce, and thus stopped the Second and Sixth Corps then attacking Longstreet. Colonel Newhall, Sheridan's Adjutant-General, rode to meet Grant and advise him that Lee desired a meeting with a view to surrendering his army.

Little has been said of the great soldier, Meade, in this campaign. Much credit is due him. He aided in organizing a victory at Five Forks (26) and in planning the assault on Petersburg. Though ill at Jetersville, and much of the time thereafter to the end of the campaign, he was always up with one or the other of his corps, doing all it was possible for him to do to accomplish the great result finally attained.

Let us again return to Grant—the silent soldier. On the 5th of April Grant and his staff with a small escort became separated from his headquarters camp equipage and wagons. He was even without his sword. He and his staff thereafter slept on porches of farm- houses or bivouacked in the woods or fields without cover. They picked up scant fare at any camp they could find it, and often went hungry, as did many other officers. As a result of exposure to frequent rains, poor food, fatigue, loss of sleep, and, doubtless, extreme prolonged anxiety, Grant, on the afternoon of the 8th, had a violent attack of sick-headache. At a farm-house that night he was induced to bathe his feet in hot water and mustard and to have mustard plasters applied to his wrists and the back of his neck, but all this brought him no relief. He lay down to sleep in vain. He, however, during the night, received and sent dispatches relating to the next day's operations. At 4 o'clock his staff found him in a yard in front of the house, pacing up and down with both hands to his head and suffering great pain. He wrote a note in the early morning answering Lee's note of the previous day. He rode early to Meade's camp (then in the immediate rear of the two pursuing corps), and there drank some coffee, with little relief. His staff tried to induce him to ride that day in an ambulance, but, sick as he was, he mounted his favorite horse—Cincinnati—and in consequence of dispatches from Sheridan giving an account of the situation at the front, started by a circuitous route to join him. Some five miles from the Court-House a dispatch from Meade was handed Grant, advising him of a two-hours' truce and of the place General Lee would meet him; also this note from Lee:

"April 9, 1865. "General,—I received your note of this morning on the picket line, whither I had come to meet you, and ascertain definitely what terms were embraced in your proposal of yesterday with reference to the surrender of this army. I now ask an interview, in accordance with the offer contained in your letter of yesterday, for that purpose.