P. S.—The cavalry is ordered to report to you at Halifax Road and Norfolk Railroad (iron bridge) at three A.M. to-morrow. W. F. Lee to be in vicinity of Monk's Corner at six A.M.

R. E. L.

THE DEATH STRUGGLE.

I had very little talk with General Lee after our withdrawal. I recognized that the end was approaching, and of course he did. It will be seen from his semi-official note, quoted above, that he became very much interested in the success of our movement. While he had known as well as I that it was a desperate and forlorn hope, still we had hoped that we might cut through and make a glorious dash down the right and seek Johnston in North Carolina. The result of the audacious attempt that had been made upon his line, and its complete success up to the time that it was ruined by a mischance, was to awaken General Grant's forces into more aggressive measures. A sort of respite was had, for a day, after the night attack on Fort Steadman, and then the death-struggle began. Grant hurried his masses upon our starved and broken-down veterans. His main attack was made upon our left, A. P. Hill's corps. Grant's object was to turn our flanks, and get between us and North Carolina. The fighting was fearful and continuous. It was a miracle that we held our lines for a single day. With barely six thousand men I was holding six miles of line. I had just one thousand men to the mile, or about one to every two yards. Hill and Longstreet were in not much better trim, and some part of this thin line was being forced continually. The main fight was on my line and Hill's, as General Longstreet was nearer Richmond. Heavy masses of troops were hurled upon our line, and we would have to rally our forces at a certain point to meet the attack. By the time we would repel it, we would find another point attacked, and would hurry to defend that. Of course, withdrawing men from one part of the line would leave it exposed, and the enemy would rush in. Then we would have to drive them out and reëstablish our line. Thus the battle raged day after day. Our line would bend and twist, and swell and break, and close again, only to be battered against once more. Our people performed prodigies of valor. How they endured through those terrible, hopeless, bloody days, I do not know. They fought desperately and heroically, although they were so weakened through hunger and work that they could scarcely stand upon their feet and totter from one point of assault to another. But they never complained. They fought sternly, grimly, as men who had made up their minds to die. And we held our lines. Somehow or other—God only knows how—we managed day by day to wrest from the Federals the most of our lines. Then the men, dropping in the trenches, would eat their scanty rations, try to forget their hunger, and snatch an hour or two of sleep.

THE EVACUATION OF PETERSBURG.

Our picket lines were attacked somewhere every night. This thing went on till the morning of the 2d of April. Early that day it became evident that the supreme moment had come. The enemy attacked in unusually heavy force, and along the line of mine and Hill's corps. It became absolutely necessary to concentrate a few men at points along my line, in order to make a determined resistance. This left great gaps in my line of breastworks, unprotected by anything save a vidette or two. Of course, the Federals broke through these undefended passes, and established themselves in my breastworks. At length, having repulsed the forces attacking the points I defended, I began reëstablishing my line. My men fought with a valor and a desperate courage that has been rarely equalled, in my opinion, in military annals. We recaptured position after position, and by four o'clock in the afternoon I had reëstablished my whole line except at one point. This was very strongly defended, but I prepared to assault it. I notified General Lee of my purpose and of the situation, when he sent me a message, telling me that Hill's lines had been broken, and that General Hill himself had been killed. He ordered, therefore, that I should make no further fight, but prepare for the evacuation which he had determined to make that night. That night we left Petersburg. Hill's corps, terribly shattered and without its commander, crossed the river first, and I followed, having orders from General Lee to cover the retreat. We spent the night in marching, and early the next morning the enemy rushed upon us. We had to turn and beat them back. Then began the most heroic and desperate struggle ever sustained by troops—a worn and exhausted force of hardly four thousand men, with a vast and victorious army, fresh and strong, pressing upon our heels! We turned upon every hilltop to meet them, and give our wagon-trains and artillery time to get ahead. Instantly they would strike us, we invariably repulsed them. They never broke through my dauntless heroes; but after we had fought for an hour or two, we would find huge masses of men pressing down our flanks, and to keep from being surrounded I would have to withdraw my men. We always retreated in good order, though always under fire. As we retreated we would wheel and fire, or repel a rush, and then stagger on to the next hill-top, or vantage ground, where a new fight would be made. And so on through the entire day. At night my men had no rest. We marched through the night in order to get a little respite from fighting. All night long I would see my poor fellows hobbling along, prying wagons or artillery out of the mud, and supplementing the work of our broken-down horses. At dawn, though, they would be in line ready for battle, and they would fight with the steadiness and valor of the Old Guard.

APPOMATTOX COURT-HOUSE.
(From a War Department photograph.)

THE LAST COUNCIL OF WAR.

This lasted until the night of the 7th of April. The retreat of Lee's army was lit up with the fire and flash of battle, in which my brave men moved about like demigods for five days and nights. Then we were sent to the front for a rest, and Longstreet was ordered to cover the retreating army. On the evening of the 8th, when I had reached the front, my scout George brought me two men in Confederate uniform, who, he said, he believed to be the enemy, as he had seen them counting our men as they filed past. I had the men brought to my campfire, and examined them. They made a most plausible defence, but George was positive they were spies, and I ordered them searched. He failed to find anything, when I ordered him to examine their boots. In the bottom of one of the boots I found an order from General Grant to General Ord, telling him to move by forced marches toward Lynchburg and cut off General Lee's retreat. The men then confessed that they were spies, and belonged to General Sheridan. They stated that they knew that the penalty of their course was death, but asked that I should not kill them, as the war could only last a few days longer, anyhow. I kept them prisoners, and turned them over to General Sheridan after the surrender. I at once sent the information to General Lee, and a short time afterward received orders to go to his headquarters. That night was held Lee's last council of war. There were present General Lee, General Fitzhugh Lee, as head of the cavalry, and Pendleton, as chief of artillery, and myself. General Longstreet was, I think, too busily engaged to attend. General Lee then exhibited to us the correspondence he had had with General Grant that day, and asked our opinion of the situation. It seemed that surrender was inevitable. The only chance of escape was that I could cut a way for the army through the lines in front of me. General Lee asked me if I could do this. I replied that I did not know what forces were in front of me; that if General Ord had not arrived—as we thought then he had not—with his heavy masses of infantry, I could cut through. I guaranteed that my men would cut a way through all the cavalry that could be massed in front of them. The council finally dissolved with the understanding that the army should be surrendered if I discovered the next morning, after feeling the enemy's line, that the infantry had arrived in such force that I could not cut my way through.

NEARING THE END.

My men were drawn up in the little town of Appomattox that night. I still had about four thousand men under me, as the army had been divided into two commands and given to General Longstreet and myself. Early on the morning of the 9th I prepared for the assault upon the enemy's line, and began the last fighting done in Virginia. My men rushed forward gamely and broke the line of the enemy and captured two pieces of artillery. I was still unable to tell what I was fighting; I did not know whether I was striking infantry or dismounted cavalry. I only knew that my men were driving them back, and were getting further and further through. Just then I had a message from General Lee, telling me a flag of truce was in existence, leaving it to my discretion as to what course to pursue. My men were still pushing their way on. I sent at once to hear from General Longstreet, feeling that, if he was marching toward me, we might still cut through and carry the army forward. I learned that he was about two miles off, with his face just opposite from mine, fighting for his life. I thus saw that the case was hopeless. The further each of us drove the enemy the further we drifted apart, and the more exposed we left our wagon trains and artillery, which were parked between us. Every line either of us broke only opened the gap the wider. I saw plainly that the Federals would soon rush in between us, and then there would have been no army. I, therefore, determined to send a flag of truce. I called Colonel Peyton of my staff to me, and told him that I wanted him to carry a flag of truce forward. He replied: