Recollections and Letters of Lee [56]
on the lines, riding Traveller as usual, it was as if some great crushing weight had been suddenly lifted from our hearts. Colonel Walter H. Taylor, his adjutant-general, says:
"The indisposition of General Lee...was more serious than was generally supposed. Those near him were very apprehensive lest he should be compelled to give up."
General Early also writes of this circumstance:
"One of his three corps commanders [Longstreet] had been disabled by wounds at the Wilderness, and another was too unwell to command his corps [A. P. Hill], while he (General Lee) was suffering from a most annoying and weakening disease. In fact, nothing but his own determined will enabled him to keep the field at all; and it was then rendered more manifest than ever that he was the head and front, the very life and soul of the army."
Chapter VII Fronting the Army of the Potomac
Battle of Cold Harbour--Siege of Petersburg--The General intrusts a mission to his son Robert--Battle of the Crater--Grant crosses the James River--General Long's pen-picture of Lee--Knitting socks for the soldiers--A Christmas dinner--Incidents of camp life
From the North Anna River the Federal Army moved by its left flank, seeking to find its adversary unprepared, but the Army of Northern Virginia steadily confronted it, ever ready to receive any attack. At Cold Harbour they paused, facing each other, and General Grant, having received sixteen thousand men from Butler by way of Yorktown on June 1st, made an attack, but found our lines immovable. In his "Memoirs" he writes:
"June 2d was spent in getting troops into position for attack on the 3d. On June 3d, we again assaulted the enemy's works in the hope of driving him from his position. In this attempt our loss was heavy, while that of the enemy, I have reason to believe, was comparatively light."
This assault was repelled along the whole line, with the most terrible slaughter yet recorded in our war. Yet in a few hours these beaten men were ordered to move up to our lines again. Swinton, the historian of the Army of the Potomac, thus describes what happened when this order was sent to the men:
"The order was issued through these officers" (the corps commanders) "To their subordinate commanders, and from them descended through the wonted channels; but no man stirred, and the immobile lines pronounced a verdict, silent, yet emphatic, against further slaughter. The loss on the Union side in this sanguinary action was more than thirteen thousand, while on the part of the Confederates it is doubtful whether it reached that many hundreds."
Colonel Walter H. Taylor, in his "Four Years with General Lee," says:
"Soon after this, he (Grant) abandoned his chosen line of operations, and moved his army to the south side of the James River. The struggle from Wilderness to this point covers a period of about one month, during which time there had been an almost daily encounter of hostile arms, and the Army of Northern Virginia had placed hors de combat of the army under General Grant a number equal to its entire numerical strength at the commencement of the campaign, and, notwithstanding its own heavy losses and the reinforcements received by the enemy, still presented an impregnable front to its opponent, and constituted and insuperable barrier to General Grant's 'On to Richmond.'"
Thus after thirty days of marching, starving, fighting, and with a loss of more than sixty thousand men, General Grant reached the James River, near Petersburg, which he could have done at any time he so desired without the loss of a single man. The baffling of our determined foe so successfully raised the spirits of our rank and file, and their confidence in their commander knew no bounds.
The two armies now commenced a contest which could end only one way. If General Lee had been permitted to evacuate Petersburg and Richmond, to fall back upon some interior point, nearer supplies for man and beast and within supporting distance of the remaining forces of the Confederacy, the surrender
"The indisposition of General Lee...was more serious than was generally supposed. Those near him were very apprehensive lest he should be compelled to give up."
General Early also writes of this circumstance:
"One of his three corps commanders [Longstreet] had been disabled by wounds at the Wilderness, and another was too unwell to command his corps [A. P. Hill], while he (General Lee) was suffering from a most annoying and weakening disease. In fact, nothing but his own determined will enabled him to keep the field at all; and it was then rendered more manifest than ever that he was the head and front, the very life and soul of the army."
Chapter VII Fronting the Army of the Potomac
Battle of Cold Harbour--Siege of Petersburg--The General intrusts a mission to his son Robert--Battle of the Crater--Grant crosses the James River--General Long's pen-picture of Lee--Knitting socks for the soldiers--A Christmas dinner--Incidents of camp life
From the North Anna River the Federal Army moved by its left flank, seeking to find its adversary unprepared, but the Army of Northern Virginia steadily confronted it, ever ready to receive any attack. At Cold Harbour they paused, facing each other, and General Grant, having received sixteen thousand men from Butler by way of Yorktown on June 1st, made an attack, but found our lines immovable. In his "Memoirs" he writes:
"June 2d was spent in getting troops into position for attack on the 3d. On June 3d, we again assaulted the enemy's works in the hope of driving him from his position. In this attempt our loss was heavy, while that of the enemy, I have reason to believe, was comparatively light."
This assault was repelled along the whole line, with the most terrible slaughter yet recorded in our war. Yet in a few hours these beaten men were ordered to move up to our lines again. Swinton, the historian of the Army of the Potomac, thus describes what happened when this order was sent to the men:
"The order was issued through these officers" (the corps commanders) "To their subordinate commanders, and from them descended through the wonted channels; but no man stirred, and the immobile lines pronounced a verdict, silent, yet emphatic, against further slaughter. The loss on the Union side in this sanguinary action was more than thirteen thousand, while on the part of the Confederates it is doubtful whether it reached that many hundreds."
Colonel Walter H. Taylor, in his "Four Years with General Lee," says:
"Soon after this, he (Grant) abandoned his chosen line of operations, and moved his army to the south side of the James River. The struggle from Wilderness to this point covers a period of about one month, during which time there had been an almost daily encounter of hostile arms, and the Army of Northern Virginia had placed hors de combat of the army under General Grant a number equal to its entire numerical strength at the commencement of the campaign, and, notwithstanding its own heavy losses and the reinforcements received by the enemy, still presented an impregnable front to its opponent, and constituted and insuperable barrier to General Grant's 'On to Richmond.'"
Thus after thirty days of marching, starving, fighting, and with a loss of more than sixty thousand men, General Grant reached the James River, near Petersburg, which he could have done at any time he so desired without the loss of a single man. The baffling of our determined foe so successfully raised the spirits of our rank and file, and their confidence in their commander knew no bounds.
The two armies now commenced a contest which could end only one way. If General Lee had been permitted to evacuate Petersburg and Richmond, to fall back upon some interior point, nearer supplies for man and beast and within supporting distance of the remaining forces of the Confederacy, the surrender