A Stillness at Appomattox: The Army of the Potomac Trilogy

by Bruce Catton

  17. Official Records, Vol. XXXIII, p. 907.

  18. Memoirs of Chaplain Life, by the Very Rev. William Corby, p. 357; Reminiscences of the 19th Massachusetts Regiment, pp. 84, 86.

  19. Three Years in the Army, p. 316; Service with the 6th Wisconsin Volunteers, pp. 241–42.

  20. Reminiscences of the War of the Rebellion, by Major Jacob Roemer, p. 30; The Diary of a Line Officer, by Captain Augustus C. Brown, p. 11; History of the First Regiment of Heavy Artillery, Massachusetts Volunteers, by Alfred S. Roe and Charles Nutt, pp. 124–36; History of the 12th Massachusetts Volunteers, by Lieutenant Colonel Benjamin W. Cook, p. 126; manuscript letters of Carl Bissell, of the 2nd Connecticut Heavy Artillery.

  21. History of the 2nd Connecticut Volunteer Heavy Artillery, p. 81; Official Records, Vol. XXXVI, Part 3, p. 110.

  22. The Road to Richmond, p. 195.

  23. Official Records, Vol. XXXIII, pp. 638–39, 688, 717; History of the Second Army Corps, p. 400. Soldiers of the Army of the Potomac usually identified themselves first with their regiment and next with their army corps. Brigades and divisions generally (with a few striking exceptions) claimed less of their loyalty.

  24. Correspondence of John Sedgwick, Major General, Vol. II, pp. 168, 175; Personal Recollections of the Civil War, by Brigadier General John Gibbon, pp. 209–10. One of the most fascinating might-have-beens of the Civil War is this move which almost put Sedgwick in charge of operations in the Valley. If he had been there instead of Sigel, the story in 1864 would have been very different. Meade planned to give John Gibbon command of the VI Corps.

  25. Brigadier General Hazard Stevens, in Papers of the Military Historical Society of Massachusetts, Vol. IV, pp. 178–79 (referred to hereafter as M.H.S.M. Papers).

  26. Francis A. Walker, in M.H.SM. Papers, Vol. X, pp. 51, 53, 56–57.

  27. For Warren, see Gouverneur Kemble Warren: the Life and Letters of an American Soldier, by Emerson Gifford Taylor, pp. 5 ff.; The Road to Richmond, p. 126; Days and Events, p. 304; Three Years in the Army, p. 349.

  28. South After Gettysburg, p. 73; History of the 87th Regiment Pennsylvania Volunteers, by George R. Prowell, p. 117.

  29. Three Years in the Army, p. 309; History of the 8th Cavalry Regiment, Illinois Volunteers, by Abner Hard, pp. 292–93; A Little Fifer’s War Diary, p. 168.

  30. Down in Dixie, pp. 165–66.

  31. The Road to Richmond, pp. 129–30.

  Chapter Two: Roads Leading South

  WHERE THE DOGWOOD BLOSSOMED

  1. Following the Greek Cross, p. 182; Recollections of a Private Soldier, pp. 42–43; Meade’s Headquarters, p. 180; Army Life: a Private’s Reminiscences, pp. 156–57; The Road to Richmond, p. 130.

  2. Down in Dixie, p. 206.

  3. Discussions of the courses open to Grant at the beginning of the 1864 campaign in Virginia are practically without number. A good brief summary of the alternatives can be found in The Virginia Campaigns of ’64 and ’65, by Major General Andrew A. Humphreys, pp. 9–12. (This book is authoritative, comprehensive, and unfortunately rather dull; it is cited hereafter as Humphreys.) For an extended study, see The Generalship of Ulysses S. Grant, pp. 209 ff. Grant discusses the matter in some detail of the Official Records, Vol. XXXVI, Part 1, pp. 12–18. I am greatly indebted to Ralph Happel, historian, Fredericksburg and Spotsylvania County National Military Park, for the loan of his manuscript account of the Battle of the Wilderness, which contains an excellent analysis of the strategy of the Wilderness campaign and its relation to the grand strategy of the final year of the war.

  4. Down in Dixie, p. 210.

  5. Campaigning with Grant, pp. 42–43.

  6. Recollections of a Private Soldier, pp. 43–46; M.H.S.M. Papers, Vol. IV, p. 185; The Road to Richmond, p. 131. Note the comment by Brigadier General Rufus Ingalls, chief quartermaster: “Our troops are undoubtedly loaded down on marches too heavily even for the road, not to speak of battle.… Our men are generally overloaded, fed and clad, which detracts from their marching capacity and induces straggling.” (Official Records, Vol. XL, Part 1, p. 39.)

  7. Campaigns of the 146th Regiment New York State Volunteers, compiled by Mary Genevie Green Brainard, p. 176; Down in Dixie, p. 176.

  8. Recollections of a Private Soldier, pp. 49–51; The Story of the Regiment, by William Henry Locke, p. 323.

  9. Campaigns of the 146th Regiment New York State Volunteers, p. 179.

  10. Army Life: a Private’s Reminiscences, pp. 217, 345–46.

  11. Campaigns of the Army of the Potomac, pp. 420–22; M.H.S.M. Papers, Vol. IV, p. 188; Following the Greek Cross, p. 183.

  12. Campaigning with Grant, pp. 50, 64–65.

  13. Army Life: a Private’s Reminiscences, p. 161.

  14. The Fifth Army Corps, by Lieutenant Colonel William H. Powell, pp. 608, 610.

  15. Colonel Theodore Lyman, in M.H.SM. Papers, Vol. IV, pp. 167–68; also in Meade’s Headquarters, pp. 90–91.

  16. Report of Emory Upton, Official Records, Vol. XXXVI, Part 1, p. 665.

  17. History of the Corn Exchange Regiment, by the Survivors’ Association, p. 400; Four Years in the Army of the Potomac, p. 129; Three Years in the Sixth Corps, by George T. Stevens, pp. 309–10; Army Life: a Private’s Reminiscences, p. 170.

  18. Campaigns of the Army of the Potomac, p. 422; Three Years in the Army, pp. 329–30; Official Records, Vol. XXXVI, Part 1, p. 614; Campaigning with Grant, p. 72.

  19. There is a good account of Wadsworth’s and Crawford’s advance in the M.H.S.M. Papers, Vol. IV, pp. 127–32. For a glimpse of Crawford, see The Road to Richmond, p. 149.

  20. Campaigns of the 146th Regiment New York State Volunteers, p. 195; Official Records, Vol. XXXVI, Part 1, pp. 601, 610–11, 614.

  21. M.H.S.M. Papers, Vol. IV, pp. 189–94; General Getty’s report, Official Records, Vol. XXXVI, Part 1, pp. 676–77.

  22. M.H.S.M. Papers, Vol. IV, pp. 192–93.

  23. Official Records, Vol. XXXVI, Part 1, pp. 696–98; Recollections of a Private Soldier, pp. 66–67.

  24. A Little Fifer’s War Diary, pp. 110–11, 302; M.H.S.M. Papers, Vol. IV, pp. 142, 193–94. For a good discussion of Federal difficulties in adjusting to woods fighting, see The Crisis of the Confederacy, by Cecil Battine, p. 382.

  25. The Road to Richmond, p. 133.

  SHADOW IN THE NIGHT

  1. Reminiscences of the 19th Massachusetts Regiment, pp. 87–88; Official Records, Vol. XXXVI, Part 1, pp. 218–19; History of the Corn Exchange Regiment, p. 403; M.H.S.M. Papers, Vol. IV, pp. 101–2; The Road to Richmond, p. 133.

  2. Recollections of a Private Soldier, pp. 52–54.

  3. Meade’s Headquarters, pp. 93–94; Official Records, Vol. XXXVI, Part 1, pp. 320–21, 667.

  4. The classic account of this, of course, is Douglas Southall Freeman’s, in R. E. Lee, Vol. III, pp. 286–88.

  5. Four Years in the Army of the Potomac, p. 130; Official Records, Vol. XXXVI, Part 1, p. 403; The Diary of a Line Officer, p. 35; Humphreys, p. 56.

  6. Recollections of a Private Soldier, p. 201.

  7. Ibid., pp. 57, 206; Army Life: a Private’s Reminiscences, p. 170; A Little Fifef’s War Diary, p. 86.

  8. M.H.S.M. Papers, Vol. IV, p. 196; History of the Second Army Corps, pp. 428–29.

  9. Official Records, Vol. XXXVI, Part 1, p. 438; M.H.S.M. Papers, Vol. IV, p. 151.

  10. History of the Second Army Corps, pp. 417, 422.

  11. Brigadier General Alexander Webb in Official Records, Vol. XXXVI, Part 1, pp. 437 ff.; also in Battles and Leaders of the Civil War, Vol. IV, pp. 159 ff.

  12. “Battle of the Wilderness and Death of General Wadsworth,” by Captain Robert Monteith, in the War Papers Read before the State of Wisconsin Commandery, Military Order of the Loyal Legion of the United States, Vol. I, p. 414; Official Records, Vol. XXXVI, Part 1, pp. 477, 934.

  13. History of the Philadelphia Brigade, by Charles H. Banes, p. 231; Meade’s Headquarters, p. 95; Official Records, Vol. XXXVI, Part 1, p. 488.


  14. M.H.S.M. Papers, Vol. IV, pp. 154–55, 200; Official Records, Vol. XXXVI, Part 1, p. 624; History of the 150th Regiment, Pennsylvania Volunteers, by Lieutenant Colonel Thomas Chamberlin, pp. 187–88.

  15. Hancock discusses all of this in some detail in his report, Official Records, Vol. XXXVI, Part 1, pp. 320–23, 325. After the war a sharp argument over the misunderstanding developed between Hancock and Gibbon; Gibbon tells about it in his Personal Recollections, pp. 387 ff.

  16. History of the 106th Regiment Pennsylvania Volunteers, pp. 201–2; Official Records, Vol. XXXVI, Part 1, p. 514; Recollections of a Private Soldier, p. 73. For a very vivid account of this phase of the battle, see The Crisis of the Confederacy, p. 385.

  17. Grant’s Personal Memoirs, Vol. II, p. 201.

  18. Campaigning with Grant, p. 59.

  19. Ibid., p. 52. For glimpses of Grant’s earlier relations with Hays, see Captain Sam Frant, pp. 128, 172.

  20. Meade’s Headquarters, p. 98; History of the 5th Regiment Maine Volunteers, p. 305; Following the Greek Cross, pp. 186–87; History of the 3rd Pennsylvania Cavalry, p. 419.

  21. Letters of a War Correspondent, p. 57; Colonel Theodore Lyman, in M.H.S.M. Papers, Vol. IV, p. 105n.; Campaigning with Grant, pp. 69–70.

  22. Four Years in the Army of the Potomac, p. 131; Following the Greek Cross, p. 188.

  23. The extent to which Grant was shaken, and the way in which he concealed his alarm, are set forth by his firm admirer, General Wilson, in Under the Old Flag, Vol. I, pp. 390–91.

  24. Campaigning with Grant, p. 74.

  25. History of the Philadelphia Brigade, p. 235; Reminiscences of the 19th Massachusetts Regiment, p. 88; Annals of the 6th Pennsylvania Cavalry, p. 237.

  26. The Road to Richmond, p. 134; Campaigning with Grant, p. 79; History of the 3rd Pennsylvania Cavalry, p. 421.

  27. Recollections of a Private Soldier, p. 79. Major General U. S. Grant, III, grandson of the Civil War general, says that as a young lieutenant just out of West Point he served under an elderly officer who had been an enlisted man in the Army of the Potomac. This officer one day remarked that the most thrilling moment of the whole war, to him, came when his column turned south at the Chancellorsville crossroads and the men realized that they were advancing instead of retreating. As Historian Ralph Happel says, in his manuscript study previously referred to, Grant’s decision to continue south after the Wilderness was “one of the most important decisions in American history.”

  28. Following the Greek Cross, p. 189.

  ALL THEIR YESTERDAYS

  1. Following the Greek Cross, pp. 189–90.

  2. History of the 3rd Pennsylvania Cavalry, pp. 421–22. In General Warren’s journal entry for May 7 (Official Records, Vol. XXXVI, Part 1, p. 540) there is reference to a delay caused by Meade’s cavalry escort. Major Small refers to it in The Road to Richmond, p. 135, and General Webb mentions it in Battles and Leaders, Vol. IV, p. 164. It should be added, of course, that various other factors delayed the move to Spotsylvania Court House, the most important probably being the job done by the Confederate cavalry under Fitzhugh Lee.

  3. History of the 12th Massachusetts Volunteers, p. 129.

  4. There is an excellent description of the approach, assault, and repulse of Robinson’s division, by Brigadier General Charles L. Pierson, in the M.H.S.M. Papers, Vol. IV, pp. 214–16, supplemented by Colonel Theodore Lyman, pp. 238–39. See also the Official Records, Vol. XXXVI, Part 1, pp. 594, 597, 619; The Story of the Regiment, p. 333; Military Memoirs of a Confederate, by E. P. Alexander, pp. 510–12.

  5. Campaigning with Grant, p. 84; Meade’s Headquarters, pp. 105–6n.

  6. Down in Dixie, p. 316; “Sheridan’s Richmond Raid,” in Battles and Leaders, Vol. IV, p. 189.

  7. Down in Dixie, pp. 276–77.

  8. The handling of the Wilderness wounded is treated in detail in the report of Surgeon Thomas A. McParlin, Medical Director of the Army of the Potomac, in the Official Records, Vol. XXXVI, Part 1, p. 220. See also Down in Dixie, p. 276; Red-Tape and Pigeon-Hole Generals, by a Citizen-Soldier, p. 242; Army Life: a Private’s Reminiscences, p. 171.

  9. Surgeon Edward B. Dalton, chief medical officer of Depot Field Hospital, in Official Records, Vol. XXXVI, Part 1, p. 270; also Surgeon McParlin’s report, in that volume, p. 234; South After Gettysburg, pp. 85–86, 88; Three Years in the Sixth Corps, p. 343.

  10. Three Years in the Sixth Corps, pp. 344–45.

  11. Report of Surgeon McParlin, Official Records, Vol. XXXVI, Part 1, pp. 227 ff.

  12. Ibid., pp. 235, 271–74.

  13. History of the First Regiment of Heavy Artillery, Massachusetts Volunteers, p. 151.

  14. South After Gettysburg, pp. 88, 90.

  15. Army Life: a Private’s Reminiscences, p. 177; Recollections of a Private Soldier, p. 88; History of the Corn Exchange Regiment, p. 410.

  16. Following the Greek Cross, pp. 191–93; Campaigning with Grant, pp. 89–90; Correspondence of John Sedgwick, Major General, Vol. II, p. 210; Battles and Leaders, Vol. IV, p. 175.

  17. Abraham Lincoln: the War Years, Vol. III, p. 47.

  18. Campaigning with Grant, p. 83.

  SURPASSING ALL FORMER EXPERIENCES

  1. The Life and Letters of Emory Upton, by Peter S. Mitchie, pp. 1–9, 12–37, 51–68.

  2. Ibid., pp. 96–98. Upton’s formal report on this assault is unusually detailed and graphic. It is in the Official Records, Vol. XXXVI, Part 1, pp. 665–68.

  3. Military Memoirs of a Confederate, p. 517; Official Records, Vol. XXXVI, Part 1, pp. 667–68.

  4. History of the Philadelphia Brigade, pp. 242–43.

  5. Ibid., p. 244; M.H.S.M. Papers, Vol. IV, p. 436.

  6. Upton’s report, op. cit., p. 668.

  7. War Diary of Luman Harris Tenney, 1861–1865, p. 115; Meade’s Headquarters, p. 110.

  8. Official Records, Vol. XXXVI, Part 1, p. 230; Battles and Leaders, Vol. IV, p. 170.

  9. The Long Arm of Lee, by Jennings C. Wise, Vol. II, pp. 787–88.

  10. Hancock’s report, Official Records, Vol. XXXVI, Part 1, p. 334.

  11. Ibid., p. 335. General Barlow described the movement of his division in the M.H.S.M. Papers, Vol. IV, pp. 245–270. His article has been drawn on liberally in the preparation of this chapter.

  12. Personal Recollections of the War of 1861, by Charles A. Fuller, pp. 9–10; The Irish Brigade and Its Campaigns, by Captain D. P. Conyngham, p. 474; Mr. Lincoln’s Army, by Bruce Catton, pp. 209–10.

  13. Barlow’s account, M.H.S.M. Papers, Vol. IV, p. 247. See also, in the same volume, the article by Lieutenant Colonel William R. Driver, p. 277.

  14. Official Records, Vol. XXXVI, Part 1, pp. 409–10.

  15. History of the 106th Regiment Pennsylvania Volunteers, p. 206; Official Records, Vol. XXXVI, Part 1, pp. 335, 470; History of the Second Army Corps, p. 470.

  16. History of the Philadelphia Brigade, p. 246; Barlow, in M.H.S.M. Papers, Vol. IV, pp. 251–52; The Long Arm of Lee, Vol. II, pp. 789–90; Military Memoirs of a Confederate, pp. 519–20.

  17. Lee’s Lieutenants, by Douglas Southall Freeman, Vol. III, pp. 404–6; Service with the 6th Wisconsin Volunteers, p. 268; Official Records, Vol. XXXVI, Part 1, pp. 373–74; M.H.S.M. Papers, Vol. IV, pp. 281–82.

  18. Military Memoirs of a Confederate, p. 522; Reminiscences of the 19th Massachusetts Regiment, p. 91; History of the Philadelphia Brigade, p. 247.

  19. Military Memoirs of a Confederate, p. 522; Barlow’s story, in M.H.S.M. Papers, Vol. IV, pp. 254–55; History of the Philadelphia Brigade, p. 248; History of the Second Army Corps, p. 473.

  20. Brigadier General Lewis A. Grant, in M.H.S.M. Papers, Vol. IV, p. 269. This fighting is graphically described by G. Norton Galloway in Battles and Leaders, Vol. IV, pp. 170–74. See also Following the Greek Cross, p. 202. Incidentally, it may be well to emphasize that the famous “bloody angle” was here, and not at the tip of the salient where Barlow’s men first broke the line.

  21. Battles an
d Leaders, Vol. IV, pp. 171–72; Official Records, Vol. XXXVI, Part 1, pp. 537, 539; History of the 150th Regiment Pennsylvania Volunteers, pp. 196–97.

  22. History of the 24th Michigan of the Iron Brigade, by O. B. Curtis, p. 243; History of the Second Army Corps, p. 475.

  23. Reminiscences of the 19th Massachusetts Regiment, p. 91; History of the 106th Regiment Pennsylvania Volunteers, p. 207; Service with the 6th Wisconsin Volunteers, p. 266; Following the Greek Cross, pp. 200–1.

  24. Following the Greek Cross, p. 200; report of Brigadier General Lewis Grant, Official Records, Vol. XXXVI, Part 1, p. 704; Reminiscences of the 19th Massachusetts Regiment, p. 92; History of the 24th Michigan in the Iron Brigade, p. 244.

  25. The Road to Richmond, p. 141; Campaigns of the 146th Regiment New York State Volunteers, pp. 205–6.

  26. Recollections of a Private Soldier, pp. 83–86; M.H.S.M. Papers, Vol. IV, pp. 297–98; Letters of a War Correspondent, p. 72; History of the First Regiment of Heavy Artillery, Massachusetts Volunteers, pp. 152–58. It might be noted that veteran troops called up to stand in support of the heavies in this fight put in a profitable afternoon looting the knapsacks which the green troops had piled in a row before going into action.

  27. My Life in the Army, by Robert Tilney, p. 53.

  Chapter Three: One More River to Cross

  THE CRIPPLES WHO COULD NOT RUN

  1. Grant’s report of the final year’s operations, Official Records, Vol. XXXVI, Part 1, pp. 20–21; Campaigning with Grant, pp. 124–25.

  2. Recollections of a Private Soldier, pp. 91–93.

  3. Recollections of the Civil War, by Charles A. Dana, p. 199.

  4. Four Years in the Army of the Potomac, p. 190.

  5. Four Years Campaigning in the Army of the Potomac, pp. 132, 134.