| Page 21 | (Siege of Richmond and Petersburg) |  |  |
Siege of
Richmond and Petersburg
In some ways the siege of
Petersburg follows the pattern of all of Grant's 1864 campaign. His
objective was the destruction of Lee's army; to do this he needed to pin Lee
down or outflank him. Right from the first Grant tried to outflank Lee's
right (eastern) flank, and that's what took the fighting to Petersburg.
Lee had two goals: preserve his army and protect Richmond. Grant could
count on Lee to fight for Richmond, so when he couldn't catch Lee in the open
field he headed for Richmond to force a showdown.
But Grant was not stupid. He knew what would happen if he threw his men
head-on at fortifications. Time after time, from Vicksburg to Spotsylvania
to Cold Harbor the results had been horrific casualties. He licked his
wounds after Cold Harbor and then moved quickly.
It was another left hook, this time southwards behind Ben Butler's Army of
the James (bottled up at Bermuda Hundred, where the inept Butler was stuck) and
east of Petersburg. It was a risky move, since he was moving across Lee's
front and crossing a major river (the James was over 2,000 feet wide at
Weyanoke) with the enemy in his rear. But Lee for once didn't scent the
enemy movement; throughout the war he'd had remarkable success at anticipating
Union moves but not this time. He started on June 12, 1864, and within two
days his four corps were at the bridge site, and in another two days all the men
were over. In eight hours the US engineers had built a pontoon bridge over
2,100 feet long over a river with a 4-foot tide and build roads to each end of
the bridge.
The goal was Petersburg, not Richmond. Grant could go around Richmond,
because the bulk of supplies came by railroads through Petersburg, so if that
city fell Richmond could survive only a few weeks. While Lee had always
moved his army rather than be outflanked, he couldn't simply move the
Confederate capitol. This time he would have to fight.
Grant was not just moving the Army of the Potomac on the chessboard of
central Virginia. Butler was an incompetent general, but away from the
indecision of their superior the troops were capable. So on June 9 Grant
sent an infantry division (under Gillmore) and a cavalry division (under Kautz)
from Bermuda Hundred to the FIRST ASSAULT ON PETERSBURG, with orders to seize
the city and destroy the railroads. Gillmore was an excellent engineer
officer, who'd done well in sieges in South Carolina, but he wasn't an
experienced field officer. He judged the Confederate lines were too
strongly manned for him to storm them, and waited for Kautz to have some effect
further west. Kautz did hardly any better: he attacked head-on against the
first defenders he found, three times. After three repulses, he found a
flank and got to the edge of the city of Petersburg. There he found more
defenders, and pulled back - with a small force of rebel cavalry snapping at his
heels. The Confederates had virtually no experienced troops in town,
mainly militia, convalescents, and youths. But they had enough against a
hesitant attack when manning the extensive defenses which had been started back
in 1862 and extended ever since.
So when Grant crossed the James, Lee thought Petersburg was reasonably safe
against known threats. Then he misjudged where Grant was going: he thought
Grant was only moving south of the Chickahominy swamps (returning to McClellan's
old stomping ground of the Seven Days Battles) where he would operate directly
against Richmond. A stratagem helped foster this misunderstanding: the
cavalry screening Grant's rear was mistaken for cavalry screening Grant's
advance - Lee made the evidence he saw fit his preconceptions. Thus, for
the three vital days of June 15-17, Lee held his main body north of the James
when Grant was launching the SECOND ASSAULT ON PETERSBURG.
On any of those three days Petersburg could have been captured, which would
have shortened the war. For the 15th Grant intended a two-pronged advance,
'Baldy' Smith's XVIII Corps coming from Bermuda Hundred (10,000 infantry
reinforced with 2,400 cavalry under Kautz and 3,700 US Colored Troops as well)
and Winfield Hancock's II Corps moving west from Weyanoke. The plan was
straightforward, but Meade didn't understand the urgency for Hancock, nor that
the idea was an assault. So Hancock was five or six hours late starting
and when he got to the Petersburg area he simply took up positions.
Thus the whole burden fell on Baldy Smith. He got the necessary dawn
start, and only had a two-hour march to Petersburg, but Beauregard had sent out
a delaying force. It was only a single cavalry regiment with an artillery
battery, but they fell back skillfully, and cost Smith three hours. With
that finally pushed aside, Smith arrived at the main defensive line, heavily
dotted with guns. Beauregard had only about 3,000 men - less than half
solid infantry - and was stalling as hard as he could in order for Hoke's
division to arrive from Bermuda Hundred. Smith's men had to pull back out
of sight to deploy for their attack - Smith was convinced that the rebels would
not deploy so many guns without substantial infantry to protect them. His
next move was to bring up his guns - but some genius of an artillery officer had
sent the horses to be watered. After yet another hour's delay, about 7pm,
the bombardment started. The rebels were silent, holding their fire until
they could smash the assaulting lines. Instead, the USCT went forward as
skirmishers, the artillery never fired, and the line was broken. They
rolled up the line after dark, and by 9pm they had ripped a 1.5-mile hole in the
fortifications. Rather than go through the hole, Smith wanted to switch
his tired men with Hancock's fresh ones, fine in theory, but it took until 11pm.
The opportunity had been there for Smith to waltz through the paper-thin
defenses (the Confederates called it the 'Battle of Old Men and Young Boys'
because the majority of their troops were city militia) but one thing after
another caused it to slip away. Also, always in everyone's mind was the
power of entrenched defenders - as Cold Harbor had demonstrated twelve days
earlier.
The 16th was another close-run thing. Lee would not send his men south
of the James, but he let Beauregard strip the Bermuda Hundred line. That
freed Bushrod Johnson's division to thicken the line at Petersburg (Beauregard's
strength approached 14,000 there) but left only 1,000 at Bermuda Hundred.
Butler's remaining troops advanced and took the trenches that faced them, but
advanced no further. To be fair to Butler, he couldn't support an advance
that went further - Lee would gobble up whatever he left out of the defenses -
but he could have wrought damage on the railroads linking Richmond and
Petersburg. But the main event would be at Petersburg. Corps were
advancing on Petersburg as fast as Grant could move them over the river; IX
Corps arrived about 10am on the 16th. But Hancock (senior officer on the
spot) was cautious. He widened the breach in the Confederate lines in the
morning, then waited until 6pm to launch his main attack. He again widened
the gap in the Confederate line - now over 2 miles - but suffered heavily
against the reinforced defenders. The rebels did not have elaborate
fortifications, but in defense they were very solid and made the Federals pay
for their gains. Hancock was satisfied with his gains, and probably
couldn't have coaxed more effort out of his disorganized men. They did
beat off a number of Confederate night attacks, as Beauregard tried to use
surprise to regain better defensive positions.
But a day had passed without a
breakthrough. Yes, Hancock had a wide breach in the defenses, but he had
hardly moved through. Meanwhile, the rebels were strengthening their
positions behind that breach - as they'd done elsewhere.
The 17th was probably the Union's last chance to take Petersburg with
relative ease. It wouldn't have been easy, but far easier than it
eventually was in 1865. The fresh IX Corps would bear the brunt of the
fighting; XVIII and II Corps had gone through an expensive day of combat.
The first move was a silent dawn attack; it worked, catching an exhausted
Confederate unit asleep. But follow-ups were expensive and never
consolidated their temporary gains. Still, the pressure exerted, the Union
gains so far, and the proximity of the Federal troops to their
lightly-entrenched line caused the Confederates to draw back to a shorter and
stronger line.
So the Confederacy weathered the crisis. On the night of June 17-18
three couriers in succession took Lee news about Federal strength south of the
James; he finally believed the reports and ordered his remaining two corps
(Anderson's and AP Hill's) south. Enough of Hill's men arrived to wreck
the next Union dawn attack (these were becoming predictable). Meade had
received reports of how weak the rebels were and ordered an attack all along the
line; he calculated that somewhere his men would break through. But
Beauregard's withdrawal and Lee's troop movement meant the attacks failed, with
very heavy losses virtually everywhere.
It was enough; Grant decided that Petersburg could not be taken by
storm. He ordered his men to entrench as close to the Confederate lines as
possible; this way if the Confederates thinned their lines too far a Union
storming party was a few minutes away. But his main effort would be to
stretch Lee to the breaking point. He would go around Lee's lines to the
south, or even probe at Richmond itself.
The first thing was to move further west around Petersburg along the
JERUSALEM PLANK ROAD; II and VI Corps were moved from the reserve. But Lee
had wind of what was up, and sent AP Hill with three divisions. The
Federals got lost in the woods; Hill found the seam, and pounced. The
veteran II Corps lost 1,700 men on June 22, many prisoners who had lost the will
to fight in the endless assaults on entrenched positions. Hancock was
reaching his limit; he was suffering from his Gettysburg wound and now his elite
II Corps was unreliable.
On the same day Grant also launched a cavalry raid, with Kautz and James
Wilson raiding westward. He counted on them having an initial advantage,
and their orders were to wreck the track unless under heavy pressure. The
raid lasted 10 days, with skirmishes at STAUNTON RIVER BRIDGE and SAPPONY
CHURCH, but achieved virtually nothing. Confederate cavalry intercepted
the raiders right from the start; cavalry dogged their steps and infantry
attacked at intervals. Wilson lost 1,500 men, burned his wagons, and
abandoned a dozen guns at REAM'S STATION I. Behind him the rails were
repaired.
The siege wasn't bad - yet. The armies still had some room to maneuver
to the west, and it hadn't lasted long enough for despair to set in. There
was plenty of sniping, monotony in the trenches, and shelling. Grant
started extending the City Point Railroad to supply his men (and especially the
horses, each of which needed as much weight of food as eight men) and looking
for ways to solve his tactical dilemma.
While doubting the possibilities of breaking the rebel defenses, Grant did
not give up hope. When the commander of the 48th Pennsylvania, a regiment
of miners, brought him a plan to tunnel under the defenses, detonate a mine, and
rush through the gap, he accepted it. In rough terms there was little to
be lost, and much to be gained. So the miners started at the end of June
and in a month they had a tunnel longer than anyone thought possible, and packed
with explosives. They were ready, the assault troops (a USCT division
under Ferrero) were ready, and the diversionary effort was ready.
The
diversion was II Corps and Sheridan's cavalry probing at Richmond. With
luck they would get through the thin Confederate line; if unlucky they would
attract rebel reserves that would otherwise be able to fill the line at
Petersburg. At DEEP BOTTOM I they were unlucky, and Lee moved a corps of
troops north to block them. After some skirmishing, they sized things up
and swung back south of the James, able to reinforce the July 30 attack.
The
attack at THE CRATER was heavily revised: new (white) troops were assigned,
because if everything went wrong Grant did not want to be accused of sending
Colored Troops to be slaughtered. But he expected success; IX Corps would
lead the way, supported on both flanks and with an entire corps in
reserve. The Union artillery smothered the rebel guns, and the mine blew
up. Ledlie's division charged while Ledlie himself got sozzled on a bottle
of rum in a dugout. The Confederates were stunned; it took 30 minutes for
their infantry to recover, an hour for the artillery to start firing. But
Ledlie's troops went straight into the Crater (30 feet deep, 97 feet wide, 150
feet long) and couldn't easily climb out. Ferrero's men had been trained
to do the right thing: go around, not through. Behind Ledlie's men crowded
Potter's and Willcox's, then Ferrero's were committed (minus Ferrero, who joined
Ledlie swilling liquor; both were later sacked). A few of the Colored
Troops did what they were taught and widened the gap, but meanwhile Confederate
reserves were arriving. Billy Mahone's small division saved the day, first
by firing into the mob in the Crater and keeping them off balance, then by
attacking and panicking the mob.
The result was a mess. Nobody had done
well except the engineers; the Union bodycount was over 4,400 (over 1,600 in
Ferrero's division alone - the Colored Troops still ended up taking the
punishment Grant feared). It probably would have worked, if given a fair
chance. But senior officers (up to Burnside himself) doubted it would
work, so they didn't do the necessary things so it could work. For
instance Burnside didn't open paths through the obstacles in front of his
trenches - so the attackers were delayed in advancing. Ferrero and Ledlie
were easy targets, but they certainly deserved all the blame they got.
Grant was back to moving north and south around Lee's main lines. The
first move (late July) was northward at DEEP BOTTOM II, with II and X Corps sent
to put pressure on Richmond so troops wouldn't go to the Shenandoah.
Nothing much was accomplished.
The next move was to the south; on August 18
Warren pulled out of the line and swung around the rebel flank to tear up the
Weldon Railroad at GLOBE TAVERN. Warren was bolstered with a bit of
cavalry and most of IX Corps. Confederate cavalry warned of his arrival,
and Henry Heth's division sliced into Warren's left flank but was too weak to do
serious damage. Lee couldn't sit still with one of the vital supply
railroads being torn up, and reinforced Heth and sent AP Hill to command it
all. Hill found a weak spot on Warren's right and pounced, while Heth came
in from the front. Warren eventually drove the Confederates back, but lost
over 2,500 prisoners. Federal troops were not fighting as hard; the long
1864 campaign had eroded morale, and many of the prisoners were
conscripts. Still, Warren had regained his original positions, but then
pulled back to more secure ground and easily repulsed another attack by
Hill. He dug in to secure his gains, and Grant now had a line that
extended from the Appomattox to the Weldon Railroad. Lee had to unload his
supplies ten miles down the line, put them on wagons, haul them around Warren's
position, and then put them back on the Southside Railroad - which increased the
strain and decreased the amount of supplies arriving.
Grant tried to press
his advantage to the south, and a few days later sent Hancock down to oversee
operations. (Hancock was acting as a deputy army commander, taking command
where more than one corps was committed.) But Lee was alive to the danger
and had plenty of troops in the area, and one of Hancock's divisions acted like
sheep. In battle at REAM'S STATION II they would neither advance nor
retreat, but stood still. Hancock was distraught; some he blamed on
conscripts and substitutes, some he blamed on lack of veterans, but he pointed
to a key item: lack of officers. Officers were killed at a much higher
rate than enlisted men throughout the war (they had to earn the right to give
orders by their valor) and through the bloody 1864 campaign officers were killed
in droves. The effect was a complete repulse of Hancock's force, and he
pulled back.
That was at the end of August; after a month of 'rest', if trench warfare was
a rest, Grant started another operation. It was another right-left
combination. North of the James River he used some of Butler's troops to
attack at CHAFFIN'S FARM. The US Colored Troops performed very well, and
overran the fort - but went no further. Confederate counterattacks
couldn't push them back but Lee could build a new line only a little further
back, and the stalemate was back.
The left hook was a mix of Parke's IX Corps and Warren's V Corps, with
Gregg's cavalry. The opening move flanked the Confederates out of one
line, and the second day's operations overran another fort around PEEBLES'
FARM. But Meade could sense growing Confederate strength. He broke
off the attack and entrenched a new line that stretched Lee a few miles further.
Lee was one of the most aggressive commanders of the war, and he knew there
was no chance for Southern victory if he stayed purely on the defensive.
In early October he struck back, north of the James along the DARBYTOWN &
NEW MARKET ROADS where Union forces were weaker. If everything worked
right, he might even overwhelm the whole Union force north of the James.
It started right, but came to a quick end, and Lee pulled his men back to their
fortifications.
About a week later Grant sent his men to probe the new Confederate line on
the DARBYTOWN ROAD. They found it, sure enough, and one brigade again
proved that a fortified defender could inflict heavy losses.
So in late October, Grant mounted his third right-left attack. He
intended to swing round Lee's right and cut the Southside Railroad, severing
Petersburg from supplies except via Richmond. But first he had to fight at
the BOYDTON PLANK ROAD. Hancock with II Corps led the way, supported by
Warren's V Corps and Parke's IX (formerly Burnside's; he was involved in a Court
of Inquiry about the Crater). Hancock led, got across the vital Plank
Road, but was intercepted. Meanwhile V and IX Corps were drawn away to
fight other rebel units and a concerted counterattack hit Hancock's men.
They fought their way out, but Grant had lost the advantage of surprise, and
pulled back after only two days operations.
Butler made another set of
ineffective moves on the northern front at FAIR OAK & DARBYTOWN ROAD, which
ended a combined effort with little results.
Grant was still as determined as ever, and as long as he held Lee's men in a
vice at Petersburg then other Union armies were basically free to tear the
Confederacy apart. Victory at Petersburg would shorten the war, there was
no doubt about that, but Union victory was all but assured once John Hood
wrecked his army in Tennessee.
Winter slowed the tempo of operations, but Grant made sure the pressure
stayed heavy. In December Warren ripped up another chunk of the Weldon
without much Confederate interference. Lee had to use more horses and
wagons to move supplies across the wintry roads, so fewer supplies got
through. Everything was in short supply before this move, and belts had to
be tightened further afterwards. Trench warfare was costing both sides,
not only in blood casualties, but in sickness.
But still Lee's men fought on: in February Grant made yet another move to the
southwest at HATCHER'S RUN, and so did Lee - the only result was that both sides
had a longer line. Yet if that was 'all' it was close to enough. Lee
was running out of reserves, and had to keep most of his army in the trenches
most of the time. The men were losing weight and strength, and disease
took a heavy toll.
Grant was plotting the complete destruction of the Confederacy in early
1865. He had a multi-pronged attack from southwestern Virginia eastward;
Sherman was cutting a swathe through North Carolina; two columns were to wreck
what remained of Confederate power in Alabama. Meanwhile, he still wanted
to break Lee's army at Petersburg before Sherman arrived in the rear.
To
increase his strength he called Sheridan's cavalry corps from over in the
Shenandoah, where they had wintered. More cavalry would not only increase
Grant's numbers, but also his mobility - especially since Lee's cavalry was worn
down in numbers and quality, with underfed horses and guns that were no match
for Union repeating carbines. On his way east Sheridan smashed the
remnants of Jubal Early's forces at WAYNESBORO and then raided through central
Virginia.
Lee knew the end was near if he didn't pull a rabbit out of his hat. So
on March 25 he planned an attack at the center-right of the Union line, at FORT
STEDMAN. There were elaborate plans on how to break the first line of
defenses, then the second line was to be overrun and the cavalry to spur through
the gap and destroy the immense Union supply base at City Point. The first
attack worked, but the second part slowed in confusion. Individual Federal
regiments counterattacked bravely and bought time for a major blow, which
smashed the rebel forces; they lost heavily in prisoners, and even lost part of
the original defense line.
And with that the siege of Petersburg was nearly over. Grant had
already picked March 29 to be the start of his spring campaign, one that would
go down in history as the APPOMATTOX CAMPAIGN. The attack at Fort Stedman
did not delay him a single day, and in three days he had broken Lee's
line. In another week Grant and Lee would be together in Wilmer McLean's
parlor at Appomattox Courthouse, and the war would be nearly over.
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