For nearly two months after Grant assumed command no important move
was attempted by either the Union or the Confederate forces except in
Mississippi. Both sides realized that a desperate struggle was impending
and each needed all the time it could gain to prepare for the coming
fray. Heavy reënforcements were hurried to Grant, until the Army of the
Potomac under his immediate command included over 120,000 men; a hundred
thousand more were assembled at Chattanooga in charge of Sherman; and
two other forces of considerable size were formed to coöperate with
Grant--one being entrusted to General Benjamin Butler and the other to
General Franz Sigel.
To oppose this vast army Lee had less than 65,000 men in the Army of
Northern Virginia and the only other formidable Confederate force in
the field was that commanded by General Joseph Johnston, who, with some
53,000 men, was stationed in Georgia guarding the cotton states and
the far South. If these two armies could be captured or destroyed,
all organized resistance to the Union would be at an end, and Grant,
accordingly, determined to throw his entire weight upon them, sending
Sherman against Johnston, Butler against the City of Richmond and Sigel
against the rich Shenandoah Valley which supplied the Confederate armies
with food, while he himself attacked Lee with an overwhelming force.
Never before had a Union general undertaken a campaign covering such a
vast extent of country and never before had such a united effort been
made to exhaust the armies and the resources of the South. With his own
forces threatened by superior numbers Lee would not be able to reënforce
Johnston with safety and, confronted by Sherman, Johnston would find it
impossible to send assistance to Lee. This promised to bring the war to
a speedy close, and the supporters of the Union redoubled their praises
of the Lieutenant-General as they began to understand his plan. Indeed,
the more he avoided publicity and applause and the more indifference
he showed for popular opinion, the more the newspapers and the general
public fawned upon him, and when, on May 3, 1864, he ordered his armies
to advance, the whole North was fairly aflame with enthusiasm.
It was certainly a momentous occasion. Three years earlier Grant had
been utterly unknown to the country at large and the small group who
acknowledged his acquaintance had regarded him as a rather pitiful
failure, while the Government to whom he had offered his services had
ignored him altogether. Now, at his nod, hundreds of thousands of men
instantly sprang to arms and the most powerful armies that America
had ever seen moved forward in obedience to his will, Sherman marching
southward, Butler creeping toward Richmond, Sigel advancing into the
fertile Shenandoah Valley, and the Army of the Potomac crossing the
Rapidan River to renew its struggle with Lee.
Lee had watched the elaborate preparations of his new antagonist with
keen interest and no little apprehension, for Grant's record as a
fighting man promised a duel to the death and the South had no more men.
The situation was certainly serious but, anxious as he was, the
Confederate commander did not by any means despair. He was familiar with
every inch of the country through which Grant would have to advance and
the chances were that this would, sooner or later, give him not only
the advantage of position, but possibly the choice of weapons. With this
idea he allowed the Union forces to cross the Rapidan unopposed, hoping
that he would soon be able to drive them back and that the river would
then be as valuable as cavalry in hampering their retreat. Just beyond
the Rapidan lay the dense thickets and waste lands of scrub oak
and undergrowth known as the Wilderness, which had witnessed the
Chancellorsville surprise and virtually sealed the fate of Hooker's
army. If the Union forces advanced directly through this jungle, there
was more than a possibility that they might outflank their opponents
and gain the road to Richmond, but Lee scarcely dared hope that
his adversary would attempt so dangerous a route. Nevertheless, he
maneuvered to leave the trap undisturbed, and when he saw the Union
columns entering the forests he felt that they were actually being
delivered into his hands. Once in those tangled thickets he knew that
Grant's artillery and cavalry would be practically useless and without
them his superiority in numbers disappeared. Of course, it would be
impossible to conduct a scientific battle in such a region, for it
would virtually be fighting in the dark, but knowing that his men were
thoroughly familiar with the ground, Lee determined to hurl them upon
the advancing bluecoats, trusting to the gloom and the terrors of the
unknown to create confusion and panic in their ranks.
But the men whom Grant commanded were no longer the inexperienced
volunteers who had been stampeded at Bull Run. They were veterans of
many campaigns and, though they staggered for a moment under the shock
of battle, they speedily rallied and fought with stubborn courage. The
conflict that followed was one of the most brutal recorded in the annals
of modern war. Whole regiments sprang at each other's throats, the men
fighting each other like animals; trees were cut down by the bullets
which tore through them from every direction; bursting shells set fire
to the woods, suffocating the wounded or burning them to death; wild
charges were made, ending in wilder stampedes or bloody repulses; the
crackle of flames rose high above the pandemonium of battle and dense
smoke-clouds drifted chokingly above this hideous carnival of death.
Thus for two days the armies staggered backward and forward with no
result save a horrible loss of life. Once the Union forces almost
succeeded in gaining a position which would have disposed of their
adversaries, but Lee saw the danger just in the nick of time and,
rushing a Texas brigade to the rescue, led the charge in person until
his troops recognized him and forced him to retire.
It was May 7, 1864, when this blind slaughter known as the Battle of
the Wilderness ceased, but by that time nearly 18,000 Union soldiers and
12,000 Confederates lay upon the field. Lee could not claim a victory
but he still held his ground and he felt confident that Grant would fall
back behind the Rapidan River to recuperate his shattered forces. No
Union commander, thus far, had tarried long on Virginian soil after
such a baptism of blood, and when the news that Grant's columns were
retreating reached the Confederate commander he breathed a sigh of
thanksgiving and relief.
To the veterans who had served under McClellan, Pope, Burnside and
Hooker, retreats were a wretchedly familiar experience, but they had not
been long on the road before they realized that they were not retreating
but were marching southward. As the truth of this dawned upon the
disheartened columns they burst into frantic cheers for Grant and
pressed forward with springy steps, shouting and singing for joy.
A less able commander would have been fatally misled by Grant's apparent
retreat, but Lee knew that he might again attempt to swing around his
right flank and edge toward Richmond by way of Spotsylvania, and to
guard against this a body of troops had been ordered to block that road.
Therefore, by the time Grant began his great turning movement, Lee was
planted squarely across his path and another series of battles followed.
Here the Union commander was able to make some use of his cavalry
and artillery, but the Confederates offset this by fighting behind
intrenchments and they repulsed charge after charge with fearful
slaughter. Again, as at the Battle of the Wilderness, the gray line was
pierced, this time at a point known as the "Bloody Angle" or "Hell's
Half Acre," and twice Lee sprang forward to lead a desperate charge to
recover the lost ground. But each time the troops refused to advance
until their beloved leader retired to a point of safety, and when he
yielded they whirled forward, sweeping everything before them.
These charges saved the battle of Spotsylvania for the Confederates. But
though Lee had again blocked his opponent, the fact that he had thrice
had to rally his troops at the peril of his life showed that he had
been harder pressed than in any of his other Virginia campaigns.
Nevertheless, when the last furious attack had been repulsed and Grant
began moving sullenly away, it seemed as though he had at last been
compelled to abandon the campaign. But the wearied Confederates had yet
to learn that their terrible opponent was a man who did not know when
he was beaten, for in spite of his awful losses he had written his
government May 11, 1864, "I propose to fight it out on this line if it
takes all summer," and his army, instead of retreating, continued to
move southward, crossing the North Anna River and circling once more
toward the left flank.
Again Grant was on the road to Richmond, but in crossing the North Anna
River he left an opening between the two wings of his army and before he
could close it Lee threw his whole force into the breach and, completely
cutting off one part of the Union army from the other, held both firmly
in check. This masterly move might have brought Grant's campaign to a
disastrous end, but just as he was planning to take full advantage of
it, Lee fell ill and during his absence from the field Grant made his
first backward move, recrossing the North Anna River and, bringing the
two wings of his army together, rescued it from its perilous position.
The moment he reached a point of safety, however, the persistent
commander recommenced his march by the left flank, sidling once more
toward Richmond until he reached Cold Harbor, only eight miles from the
Confederate capital. Here Lee once more interposed his battered forces,
strongly intrenching them in a position that fairly defied attack. With
any other adversary against him he would have concluded that the game
was won, for by all the rules of war the Union army was completely
balked and could not avoid a retreat. But Grant was a man of a different
caliber from any he had encountered heretofore. In spite of checks and
disasters and unheard-of slaughter he had pushed inexorably forward;
foiled in front he had merely turned aside to hew another bloody path.
To him defeat only seemed to mean delay, and apparently he could not be
shaken from his dogged purpose, no matter what the cost. At Cold Harbor,
however, the Confederate position was so strong that to assault it was
madness, and Lee could not believe that even his grim opponent would
resort to such a suicidal attempt. But retreat or attack offered no
choice to Grant's mind, and on June 2, 1864, the troops were fiercely
hurled against the Confederate works, only to be repulsed with fearful
slaughter. A few hours later orders were issued to renew the assault,
and then postponed for a day.
That delay gave the soldiers an opportunity to understand the desperate
nature of the work that lay before them and, realizing that charging
against murderous batteries and trenches meant rushing into the jaws of
death, they offered a silent protest. Not a man refused to obey orders,
not one fell from his place in the line, but to their coats they sewed
strips of cloth bearing their names and addresses so that their bodies
might be identified upon the field.
This dramatic spectacle might well have warned their commander of the
hopelessness of his attempt, but fixed in his resolve to thrust his
opponent from his path, he gave the fatal order to charge, and twenty
minutes later 3,000 of his best troops fell before the smoking trenches
and the balance reeled back aghast at the useless sacrifice. This
horrifying slaughter, which Grant himself confessed was a grievous
blunder, brought the first stage of his campaign to a close. In but
little over a month he had lost nearly 55,000 men--almost as many as
Lee had had in his entire army, and almost in sight of the spires of
Richmond his adversary held him securely at arm's length.
A wave of horror, indignation and disappointment, swept over the North.
Another campaign had proved a failure. There were, however, two men who
did not agree with this conclusion. One was Grant, pouring over the maps
showing the movements of all his armies. The other was Lee, looking in
vain for reënforcements to fill the gaps in his fast thinning lines.