Army of the Potomac, and does not include the Ninth Corps at the Wilderness and Spottsylvania Court House. According to a memorandum of General Warren, the killed and wounded of the Fifth Corps during the period stated by Surgeon McParlin exceeded 11,000. In the latter part of November, the season for active operations having ceased, General Hancock was called to Washington by the Secretary of War to organize the new First Army Corps, which, it was expected, would be ready to take the field in the spring, when the roads and country would admit of the resumption of active operations. He had served in the Army of the Potomac with the greatest distinction from its earliest operations at Williamsburg down to the time of his leaving it, being conspicuous in all its battles and operations. CHAPTER XII. THE WINTER OF 1864-65-MOVEMENT TO BREAK UP THE WAGON-TRAIN ROUTE OF SUPPLY FROM HICKSFORD, ON THE WELDON RAILROAD, TO PETERSBURG, AND EXTENSION OF OUR INTRENCHMENTS TO HATCHER'S RUN-THE CAPTURE AND RECAPTURE OF FORT STEDMAN - PREPARATIONS ΤΟ MOVE AGAINST LEE'S RIGHT FLANK AND THE DANVILLE AND SOUTH SIDE RAILROADS. THE defeat of General Early at Cedar Creek on the 19th of October by General Sheridan substantially closed the campaign in the Valley of Virginia. The Sixth Corps was returned to the Army of the Potomac, arriving before Petersburg by divisions between the 4th and 16th of December, and Brig.-General T. M. Harris's division of the Army of West Virginia was also detached from General Sheridan's command, and was sent to the Army of the James. About the same time General Early's corps, now commanded by General Gordon, rejoined the Army of Northern Virginia. Kershaw's division had returned to it in the latter part of November. The Army of Northern Virginia now had an effective force of infantry amounting to 50,000.1 Wise's brigade is not included in the above numbers. Wise's brigade in the Return of December 20th, and that of November 30th, and in Returns preceding it, is In December the Twenty-fourth Corps was organized from the white troops of the Army of the James, and the Twentyfifth Corps from the colored troops of that army, to which Ferrero's division of the Ninth Corps was added. General Ord was in command of the Twenty-fourth Corps; General Weitzel of the Twenty-fifth. The Tenth and Eighteenth Corps were discontinued. In January General Terry was detached from the Army of the James, having with him General Ames's division and Colonel J. C. Abbott's brigade of the Twenty-fourth Corps, and General Chas. J. Paine's division of the Twenty-fifth Corps, in all a force of 8,000 infantry, to take part with the Navy in the attack on Fort Fisher at the northern entrance to the Cape Fear River. When that was accomplished, he was to unite with the Twenty-third Corps under Major-General Schofield. This corps was to be brought from the West, and after taking Wilmington on the Cape Fear River, was to join General Sherman when he should advance northward from Savannah. In the same month General Hoke with his division (whose effective strength was 5,517) was sent to aid in the defence of Fort Fisher and Wilmington. During the winter General Butler's cavalry division (formerly Hampton's) was allowed to return to South Carolina to obtain fresh horses, and fill up the ranks. General Hampton at the same time was placed on duty in the South. not included in Johnson's division, but is reported separately as the First Military District. November 10th, the effective force of Johnson was 6,494, the effective force of Wise 2,271. November 30th, Johnson 6,504; Wise, 2,345. December 20th, Johnson, 6,692; Wise, 520. It is not stated where the other three-fourths of Wise's brigade were on December 20th. Evidently they are not included in Johnson's division. Wise's brigade was present at the closing operations around Petersburg, but does not appear in the Return of the Army of Northern Virginia of February 20th, 1865, the last Return of that army to be found among the Confederate archives in the possession of the War Department. During December General Warren, having Mott's division of the Second Corps and Gregg's cavalry added to his own corps, destroyed the Weldon Railroad, as far as Hicksford on the Meherrin River, about forty miles from Petersburg. General A. P. Hill was sent to interrupt him, but not in time. The work was completed and the troops returned to their camps without his encountering them. During the winter the Army of Northern Virginia was posted in its intrenchments in the following manner: General Hill, on the Confederate right, held from Hatcher's Run to Fort Gregg; Generals Gordon and Anderson held from his left to the Appomattox, and General Longstreet from the Appomattox to the Confederate left at White Oak Swamp. In the course of the winter the imperfect intrenchments at and in the vicinity of Hatcher's Run were very much strengthened, and new and strong intrenchments were thrown up on the south side of Hatcher's Run at the Crow house, a mile and a half above Armstrong's mill, and at Burgess's mill, where the Boydton plank-road crosses the run, and along the south side of the run covering the White Oak road as far as its intersection by the Claiborne road, then northward covering that road also as which the works terminated. front of these new works. strength but watched.1 far as Hatcher's Run, upon Heavy slashing covered the They were not occupied in 1 In the spring of 1865, when these works were completed, the Confederate intrenchments were thirty-seven miles in length from the White Oak Swamp on their left to the Claiborne road crossing of Hatcher's Run on their right. This length is not measured along the irregularities of the general line of intrenchments, much less along those of the parapet line. Eight miles of these intrenchments were north of James River, five were on the Bermuda Hundred front, and sixteen on the Petersburg line. The space along James River between Chapin's Bluff and Bermuda Hundred, which was held by heavy artillery was four miles in length. The space along the Appomattox River from the Bermuda Hundred intrenchments to the left of their Petersburg intrenchments, which space was held by batteries of artillery, was also four miles in length. The winter of 1864-65 was one of unusual severity, making the picket duty in front of the intrenchments very severe. It was especially so to the Confederate troops with their threadbare, insufficient clothing, and meagre food, chiefly corn bread made of the coarsest meal. Meat they had but little of, and their Subsistence Department was actually importing it from abroad. Of coffee or tea and sugar, they had none except in the hospitals. It is stated that in a secret session of the Confederate Congress the condition of the Confederacy as to subsistence was declared to be: That there was not meat enough in the Southern Confederacy for the armies it had in the field. That there was not in Virginia either meat or bread enough for the armies within her limits. That the supply of bread for those armies to be obtained from other places depended absolutely upon keeping open the railroad connections of the South. That the meat must be obtained from abroad through a seaport. That the transportation was not now adequate, from whatever cause, to meet the necessary demands of the service. That the supply of fresh meat to General Lee's army was precarious, and if the army fell back from Richmond and Petersburg, that there was every probability that it would cease altogether. The condition of the deserters who constantly came into our lines during the winter appeared to prove that there was no exaggeration in this statement. Some time in February the Confederate commissariat was got into better condition, and Lee's army was better rationed from that time until the fall of Richmond and Petersburg, and reserve dépôts were maintained at Richmond, Lynchburg, Danville, and Greensboro', containing three and a half millions rations of meat and two and a half millions rations of bread. But the rolling stock of the railroads was so worn that it could no longer bring the necessary number of rations |