Not until he established communication with John C. Breckinridge did Early learn of Hunter’s movements. Breckinridge was at Lynchburg, organizing its defenses as best he could. Besides his two small brigades of infantry, he had the corps of cadets of the Virginia Military Institute and two badly mounted and poorly armed forces of cavalry, under John McCausland and John Imboden. As soon as Early ascertained that Breckinridge was facing odds he could not hope to beat, he requisitioned rolling stock of the adjacent railroads to move his troops to Lynchburg. Old Jube was furiously in earnest and was to balk at nothing.
At 1:00 P.M. on the seventeenth, when he reached Lynchburg with the van of Ramseur’s division, Early found Breckinridge in bed recuperating from an old wound that a fall from a horse had made angry. By good chance, Harvey Hill was in the city and had helped put the troops to fortifying. Harry Hays was there, recovering from a wound received at Spotsylvania, and he tendered his services. The invalided Arnold Elzey was on his way to Lynchburg from Richmond. With these commanders and those of Ramseur’s division, Early occupied the trenches against the challenge of the enemy.
On June 18, Early held to the defensive as his remaining troops came up slowly. A few small-scale attacks were made on him during the afternoon and were repulsed easily. Early made his preparations to attack on the nineteenth, only to learn, soon after midnight, that Hunter was in retreat. At dawn pursuit began. That was all Jube could do. He had saved Lynchburg and the Southside Railroad; he had ended the third Federal diversion; he had not destroyed Hunter.19
3
TOWARD IMMOBILIZED COMMAND
These days had witnessed a new climax in the struggle for Richmond. On June 13, as the Second Corps was beginning its long march west, the troops who remained on the line at Cold Harbor ascertained that the enemy had left their front. Grant had undertaken another shift. The probability that he might move to the south of the James River had been recognized, but his departure was into baffling, heavily wooded country. While Grant made the most of the day’s march that either adversary could steal on the other in that difficult terrain, Lee searched for him. By the afternoon of June 15, but not before that time, the Confederate command knew Grant’s approximate position and perceived how readily the Union army could move over the James to Petersburg.
The next day, June 15, Petersburg, not Richmond, became the theater and Beauregard’s troops, rather than Lee’s, the actors. On the road from City Point to Petersburg Dearing’s cavalry sent word of a Federal advance. Beauregard had on the front opposite Bermuda Hundred and in front of Petersburg a force slightly in excess of 5,400. Of these, about 2,200 of all arms defended Petersburg. Wise’s Virginia brigade was concentrated immediately on the Petersburg earthworks that faced the approaching Federals. Fighting opened quickly. With varying fortune and no great show of initiative on the part of the assailants, the day passed. Wise’s men closed on the second line and prepared to renew the contest at dawn. To aid them, Beauregard stripped almost naked the front opposite Bermuda Hundred and appealed in loudest terms for help from Lee.20
As soon as it had seemed probable on the fourteenth that Grant might cross the James, Hoke’s division was ordered to the pontoon bridge above Drewry’s Bluff. Hoke reached the Petersburg front during the night of the fifteenth. Richmond and Petersburg, either or both, now were in acutest danger. Grant had the initiative, had superior force, and had alternatives of action. Anything might happen, and happen swiftly, once the Union army had shaken itself loose and could strike where it chose.
Beauregard and Lee faced different aspects of the same difficult problem. For Beauregard the question was whether he could retain his long lines with his small forces until larger help came from Lee. His conclusion was that if he were to hold Petersburg till relief came, it would have to be by abandoning and not merely stripping the so-called Howlett Line across Bermuda Hundred Neck. Lee, in his turn, did not feel he could reinforce Beauregard heavily at the expense of the scanty divisions defending the capital. It seemed probable, from the first intelligence reports, that those of Butler’s troops sent to Grant were being returned. If they were all who faced Beauregard, he could checkmate them with moderate assistance. In the event Grant was detaching heavily from his own army to assist Butler’s, then Beauregard must have larger reinforcements. The instant essential was to ascertain whether any of Grant’s troops, as distinguished from Butler’s, were on the south side of the James.
Early on the sixteenth Beauregard could not procure information; Lee could not act without it. To save Petersburg, the Confederate rear guard in front of Bermuda Hundred had in mid-morning to evacuate a second line. Troops of Johnson’s division were able to reach Petersburg in time to support Wise and Hoke. In late afternoon they faced so heavy an assault that they abandoned another part of the works. During these stubborn exchanges, which continued into the night, army headquarters were transferred to the south side of the James. First Corps units were moved there to meet any new threat and to recover the Howlett Line. This put on the Southside a total of about 22,600 of Lee’s troops and left north of the James Powell Hills Third Corps, Kershaw’s division of the First, and most of the cavalry—a total of approximately 21,000.
As night of June 16 approached, the unsettled question remained: It had not been possible to ascertain whether Butler alone, or Butler with large help from Grant, was attacking Petersburg. Near the end of the day’s struggle, Beauregard reported the presence of Hancock’s II Corps, but beyond that he confessed, “No satisfactory information yet received of Grant’s crossing James River.” That news had to be weighed. There was a chance that Grant was perpetrating a ruse and that he would strike at Richmond when he thought Lee’s back was turned.21
The seventeenth of June brought new suspense to the Confederate capital and long hours of exciting adventure and gnawing uncertainty on the Southside. Veteran troops of the First Corps, under the calm and competent direction of Dick Anderson, had no difficulty in clearing Butler’s X Corps from most of the Bermuda Hundred lines seized by the Federals when Beauregard had sent the defenders to Petersburg. A countermand had reached Pickett too late, and his troops rushed forward. Said the commanding general, “I believe that they will carry anything they are put against. We tried very hard to keep Pickett’s men from capturing the breastworks of the enemy but couldn’t do it.”
Beauregard had a more difficult day. His first dispatch of the morning to the commanding general included in a new form the familiar proposal that Lee give him sufficient reinforcements to “take the offensive [and] thus get rid of the enemy here.” Almost before the message was sent, the situation indicated that the enemy might “get rid” of Beauregard. An assault carried the Unionists into the works; 4 guns, 5 colors, and 600 prisoners were captured. Beauregard fought shrewdly and beat back repeated assaults, but he was nearing adversely the end of a desperate gamble. He telegraphed Lee: “We greatly need reinforcements to resist such large odds against us. The enemy must be dislodged or the city will fall.”
All the reports of the morning and early afternoon confirmed the probability that a greater part of Grant’s army had crossed the James. Powell Hill was ordered to march the Third Corps to Chafin’s Bluff, whence he could move quickly to defend Richmond or cross the James and proceed to Petersburg. Kershaw’s division, which had been waiting at Chafin’s Bluff, was ordered to the Howlett Line. As a matter of military instruction, it was much to be regretted that virtually none of Lee’s lieutenants witnessed this demonstration of his methods of sifting and interpreting his intelligence reports.
From Beauregard, about night, came a dispatch that was the more serious because it was not theatrical. Increasing numbers in his front would compel him that night to withdraw to a shorter line. “This I shall hold as long as practicable, but, without reinforcements, I may have to evacuate this city very shortly.” This indicated more pressure than had been observed previously, and it appeared to Lee that Beauregard now genuinely needed further reinforcement.
Kershaw therefore was directed to Petersburg at dawn. Powell Hill received orders to cross the pontoon bridge above Drewry’s Bluff and await developments. No troops besides Lee’s cavalry and the garrison at Richmond remained north of the James.22
The next few hours were decisive. Toward evening on the seventeenth the assaults on Beauregard had become more furious. Another section of the line was breached. A necessary counterattack by Matt Ransom’s North Carolina brigade cost it many lives. By the time Ransom’s men threw the Federals out of the salient they had taken, Beauregard was poised for a withdrawal to a new position that had been staked out by his capable chief engineer. Old Bory had the campfires piled high and the picket-line advanced. Then, under strictest injunction of silence, his men moved to the rear and went to work on the construction of a new inner line.
During the night a report by Rooney Lee of a Federal pontoon bridge across the James reached headquarters. This information removed the last doubt from Lee’s mind. Grant evidently had shifted the entire infantry battle to the Southside. If his “left flank movement” had not succeeded north of the James, he would renew it where there would be no broad river to halt him. Regrouping of forces began immediately. Kershaw’s orders stood: He was to proceed to Petersburg to reinforce Beauregard’s weary men. Powell Hill was to follow Kershaw. On the Lynchburg front, Jubal Early was to push his offensive or, if that proved impossible, return to Petersburg. Army headquarters were to be moved to Petersburg. The secretary of war instructed all officers exercising separate commands in Virginia and North Carolina to receive their orders from General Lee.23
By these movements adequate reinforcements were assured the defenders of Petersburg. The night’s labor on the new works had completed the exhaustion of Beauregard’s troops. When they saw the glint of the morning sun on Kershaw’s bayonets, they wept and cheered. As for Petersburg folk, their supreme hour came that afternoon, June 18, when Hill’s corps marched through the city to take position on the line. The danger of sudden catastrophe passed.
For four reasons, the army’s task now was vastly complicated. Because of the strength of Grant’s position and the weight of his numbers, Lee, in the first place, could not afford to attack the Union entrenchments unless the necessity was desperate. At the same time, the army had to defend the approaches of Richmond as well as of Petersburg, and, third—cost what it might—the army must keep open lines of supply from the south. “If this cannot be done,” Lee said, “I see no way of averting the terrible disaster that will ensue.”24 Finally, in the planning and execution of this difficult military course, the Confederates were crippled by lack of men and by loss of leaders. Many regiments had been reduced in size to companies, and brigades to regiments, and divisions to brigades.
One after another, between June 18 and July 30, these four obstacles to offensive strategy presented acute strategic problems. The first test came almost before the tired troops had begun to recover. On June 21-22 the launching of another cavalry raid, under Brigadier General James H. Wilson, was accompanied by an infantry demonstration against the Weldon Railroad near Petersburg. Wilson got away on an errand of mischief, but William Mahone plunged into a gap in the Union infantry force and took 1,600 prisoners. In this affair, Perry’s Florida brigade particularly distinguished itself.
The next excitement was over Wilson’s wide-ranging cavalry raid. After tearing up a long stretch of the Petersburg and Weldon, the raiders struck westward and did much damage to the Southside Railroad and still more to the Richmond and Danville. Wilson then wheeled and made for Reams’s Station on the Weldon tracks, where he expected the Union lines to be extended. Hampton led his and Rooney Lee’s divisions to Reams’s where Mahone and Fitz Lee were waiting. Virtually surrounded, Wilson had to burn his wagons and cut his way out. This fine Confederate success yielded more than 1,000 prisoners and 13 guns; but the defeat of the raiders did not alter the fact that they had destroyed 60 miles of railways. This was the grimmest of all warnings that a superior Federal cavalry force at any time might interrupt and destroy communications on which the very existence of the army depended.25
The daily incidents of trench warfare at Petersburg soon showed how grievously the numerically inferior Confederate army was to suffer from attrition when it was chained down and unable to employ the offensive strategy that had won it many battles. Sharpshooting became costly and began to be demoralizing. “There is the chill of murder about the casualties of this month,” said one brigadier in reporting the losses of July.26 The constant danger of mortar fire added to the miseries of life.
After the first of July, mysterious and concealed activity at Elliott’s Salient on the line of Bushrod Johnson’s division indicated the enemy was mining. Countermining was begun, but nowhere could the Confederates break into the enemy’s gallery. To reassure the troops, new works were constructed in rear and were nearing completion late in July. While the lines were agog with talk of shafts and tunnels, reports indicated Federal infantry being assembled on the Richmond front. Joe Kershaw and his division were sent back across the James, and on July 27-28 met what Grant had intended as a surprise diversionary attack to cover a new raid by Sheridan against the Virginia Central. In confused fighting Kershaw’s men attacked successfully, but then had to retreat in greater haste than glory, with the loss of 300 prisoners and several colors. This affair at Deep Bottom prevented a raid by Sheridan, but at the same time, the demonstration compelled Lee to transfer so many troops that Grant thought the time ripe for a direct attack on Petersburg.27
On the morning of July 30, at dawn, the Confederate works at Elliott’s Salient were blown high into the air by 8,000 pounds of powder. By the explosion at least 278 men were killed instantly or buried under hundreds of tons of earth, but the Federals who quickly rushed into the crater of the mine were slow and hesitant in assailing the breached line. The Confederates on either side of the crater, and to the south of it, rallied quickly and held their works. By 10 o’clock Mahone’s division, admirably led, recovered most of the trenches the Federals had occupied. With 20 flags, perhaps 1,500 prisoners, and at least 3,500 Federals killed and wounded to offset their own gross losses of 1,500, the Confederates had won a unique victory. “It was the saddest affair I have witnessed in the war,” said Grant. “Such opportunity for carrying fortifications I have never seen and do not expect again to have.”28
To many a Confederate soldier, it has to be recorded, the Battle of the Crater, that hot thirtieth of July, connoted warfare of a more savage character because of the employment of Negroes against them. The change of mental attitude was startling. Of the Federals the usual remark had been, “They fit us, we fit them.” Now it was different. The explosion of the mine was a “mean trick,” the use of Negro troops an infamy. For the first time, said a hospital matron, she heard the wounded curse the enemy. It had been a desperate day in a cause daily more desperate.29
4
ATTRITION IN A CHANGED ARMY
An exchanged prisoner of war, reading in the Richmond papers of the Battle of the Crater, would have encountered so many unfamiliar names that he might have concluded that Lee had a new army. The trenches destroyed by the explosion were occupied by Elliott’s South Carolina brigade; it had only come to Virginia in May. Nearby was Grade’s brigade, associated with none of the great contests of the old Army of Northern Virginia. Wise’s brigade, which participated gallantly in the action of July 30, had been absent for months from Virginia. All these troops were commanded by Major General B. R. Johnson. So unfamiliar was he that the public might have thought the initials incorrect, and the soldier Old Allegheny Johnson. At the instance of Beauregard, Bushrod Johnson was promoted to divisional rank after the fight at Drewry’s Bluff.
What was true of the unfamiliarity with Johnson’s division—the brigades of Henry Wise, Matt Ransom, Stephen Elliott, and Archibald Gracie—was true in large part of Hoke’s division. Hagood’s South Carolina brigade had come to Virginia during the emergency of Butler’s attack. T
homas L. Clingman’s North Carolina brigade had not fought as a unit of the Army of Northern Virginia until Cold Harbor. Kirkland’s brigade was a familiar one that had suffered cruelly at Bristoe Station. Colquitt’s brigade, the fourth unit of Hoke’s division, had left Virginia after Chancellorsville to fight in Florida. It had been returned for the critical summer campaign. Thus two of the eight infantry divisions were in large part new to Lees army. Of their eight brigade commanders, two only, Colquitt and Kirkland, had been schooled under the commanding general—and Colquitt had not shone in his last previous campaign in Virginia.
Still other officers of untested skill as brigade commanders had now to be promoted to fill vacancies that could not remain open. The list of brigades needing competent direction was long. No successor had been named to Abner Perrin, whose Alabama brigade had been Cadmus Wilcox’s. Second, Rans Wright was absent by illness from a famous brigade that required a temporary commander of appropriate rank and prestige. Next, James L. Kemper had been exchanged as a prisoner of war but was so much weakened by the wound received at Gettysburg that he had been assigned to command the Virginia reserves. W. W. Kirkland had fallen at Cold Harbor with an injury that would involve long absence from his North Carolinians. In the same battle, George Doles lost his life and left one of the best brigades without a leader. A sixth vacancy had been caused by the death of Grumble Jones at Piedmont. The addition of scattered cavalry regiments to the army made a seventh nomination for brigade command desirable. An eighth and a ninth were necessary to fill the places of the promoted Hoke and the dead Micah Jenkins.
Some of these vacancies had been continued beyond the reorganization of June 4 because circumstances then had prompted delay or else because senior colonels were doing well enough to justify a trial before final decision was made. Most of the other cases were those of the tragic attrition that had been increasing rapidly since May. More frequent battles at close quarters had prompted officers to take more desperate personal risks when their men fought somewhat less well and the Federals fought better. Generals were being killed more rapidly than they could prudently be selected. Appointments had to be made when—but not until—reasonably well qualified men could be found. On occasion, brigades had to be entrusted to men of limited competence in the hope that the experience of the divisional commander and of the men themselves would make good the deficiencies of the new brigadiers.
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