advance arrived it was received with a heavy cannon and musketry fire. The Union line wavered and fell back, and General Warren had great difficulty in keeping the men in order. Sedgwick with part of his corps came up, and amid almost continual skirmishing the two sides prepared for another battle. By Monday (May 9) the whole Union army was in line in front of the Spottsylvania ridge on which Lee was posted. While the lines were forming the sharpshooters were busy on both sides. The Confederate riflemen, perched in high forest trees, where they were hidden among the leaves, played havoc along the Union line, picking off the officers wherever they showed themselves. About the middle of the day General Sedgwick, the loved commander of the Sixth Corps, walked out with

Colonel McMahon, his chief of staff, to the front of the line, where some of his men were placing a battery. The bullets of the sharpshooters hummed like bees in the air, and made the soldiers dodge and duck their heads behind the breastwork which had been thrown up. The General smiled as he saw this, and said:

"Pooh! pooh! men,

who ever heard of a soldier dodging a bullet! Why, they couldn't hit an elephant at that distance!"

Some of the men laughed at this, and the General was still smiling, when Colonel McMahon heard the buzz of a bullet which seemed to burst close beside him.

"That must have been an explosive bullet, General," he said. There was no answer, and turning he was just in time to catch General Sedgwick in his arms as he fell. The ball had struck him just under the left eye, and passed out of the back of the head. He never spoke again.

Sedgwick's death was greatly lamented by his men, with whom he was a great favorite. His loss, too, was a severe one

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BATTLE OF SPOTTSYLVANIA..

439

to the Union cause, for he was a fine soldier and one who could always be depended upon to do his duty. He was succeeded in command of the Sixth Corps by General H. G. Wright.

The 10th of May was spent in artillery-firing and in sharp fighting, but without any gain to either side. General Grant, however, thought he saw a chance for success, and early the next morning he sent to Washington a despatch, saying: "We have now ended the sixth day of very hard fighting. The result to this time is much in our favor. .

I propose to fight it out on this line if it takes all summer." But the Confederates also considered that the result up to that time was in their favor, for the at

tacks on their position had been thus far repulsed.

There was some skirmishing during the morning of the 11th, but in the afternoon rain began to fall, and there was a lull in the fighting. Soon after midnight Hancock's corps was moved to a place opposite the centre of the Confederate line, shown near the middle of the

JOHN SEDGWICK.

map (page 440), where Grant thought there was a weak point. The night was so dark that the troops had to march through the woods by the aid of the compass. At dawn, under cover of a dense fog, the men marched toward the Confederate works. Silently they moved over the broken ground and through the thick woods until they were half up the slope. Then, with a wild cheer, they dashed forward through the abatis, and the next minute were over the intrenchments. The Confederates, who were breakfasting, were taken by surprise and, though they fought desperately with bayonets and clubbed muskets, soon overpowered. General Edward Johnson, of Ewell's Corps, was taken prisoner with nearly his whole command, about three thousand men, and thirty cannons.

Among the prisoners was General George H. Stewart, of Maryland, who had been an old army friend of Hancock's. When he was taken to the rear, Hancock cordially extended his hand to him, saying, "How are you, Stewart?"

"I am General Stewart," replied the prisoner haughtily, "of the Confederate army, and under the circumstances I decline to take your hand."

"And under any other circumstance, General," replied Hancock, "I should not have offered it."

Hancock, though he did not know it at the time, had nearly cut the Confederate army in two by his capture of this position. General Lee saw the peril at once, and fresh troops were quickly moved up from the right and the left to repel the attack. Hancock's men pushed on through the woods toward Spottsylvania Court-House nearly a mile, when they were stopped by a second line, from which they were greeted with a terrible hail of deadly missiles. After hard fighting the Union

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TERRIBLE MUSKETRY FIRE.

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men were forced back to the works which they had captured. The Confederates, heavily reinforced, tried many times to recapture the intrenchments. Regardless of the rain, which fell all the afternoon, they attacked again and again, struggling hand to hand with the energy of despair, and not ceasing their efforts until near midnight. Meanwhile, in order to keep the Confederates from sending troops against Hancock, Grant had ordered an attack along the whole line. Many charges were made, with great slaughter on both sides, but with little gain. on either side. Hancock still held what he had won, but the Confederates had another stronger line behind it.

During this battle, which was one of the bloodiest of the war, about ten thousand men having fallen on each side, occurred one of the heaviest musketry fires ever known. The space in front of Hancock, where the hardest fighting took place, was covered with large trees, which were so cut and scarred by bullets that at least half of them were killed. In many cases large trunks were cut entirely in two by musket balls. In the War Department, Washington, is shown part of an oak tree nearly two feet thick which was thus cut down.

During these battles the troops were changed many times from place to place along the lines. The first position held is shown in the upper part of the map, and Hancock's position in the battle of the 12th near the middle. After that battle nearly a week was spent in skirmishing, cutting roads in the woods, and in searching for a weak place in the Confederate line. The corps were gradually moved round toward the left until they came into the second position shown in the map. But wherever an attack was made the enemy were found in force, and at last Grant, finding that Lee's position could not be taken, determined to march round him again. During this time Grant received large reinforcements from Washington, fully making up all his losses. On the night of May 21st Grant left the position before Spottsylvania, and after a two days' march reached the North Anna River; but Lee had suspected his design, and put his army in motion to head him off again, and when the Union troops reached the North Anna their old enemy was still in front of them on the opposite bank. Part of the army succeeded in crossing, but Lee was found too strongly posted to be attacked with success, and Grant withdrew his troops and continued his march southward,

CHAPTER XXXVI.

GRANT AND LEE.

BUTLER AT BERMUDA HUNDRED.-BEAUREGARD ATTACKS HIM.-BOTTLED UP.-CROOK'S RAID.— MORGAN DEFEATS AVERILL.-BRECKINRIDGE DEFEATS SIGEL.-BATTLE OF PIEDMONT.— HUNTER IN WEST VIRGINIA. SHERIDAN AND STUART.-BATTLE AT YELLOW TAVERN.-DEATH OF STUART.-LEE AT COLD HARBOR.-CAVALRY FIGHT.-BATTLE OF COLD HARBOR.-GRANT'S CHANGE OF BASE.-TERRIBLE SLAUGHTER.-THE ARMY CROSSES THE JAMES.-PETERSBURG ATTACKED. EARLY CROSSES THE POTOMAC.-BATTLE OF THE MONOCACY.-BALTIMORE EXCITED.-CAPTURE OF GENERAL FRANKLIN.-HIS ESCAPE.-EARLY ATTACKS WASHINGTON.— HE IS DRIVEN BACK TO VIRGINIA.-DEFEAT OF CROOK.-CONFEDERATE CAVALRY IN PENNSYLVANIA.-CHAMBERSBURG BURNED.-SHERIDAN IN COMMAND.-BATTLE OF OPEQUAN CREEK. -FISHER'S HILL.-CEDAR CREEK.-SHERIDAN'S RIDE.-THE PETERSBURG MINE.-HANCOCK'S FIGHT. THE WELDON RAILROAD.-DUTCH GAP CANAL.

HILE Grant is moving toward the old battle-grounds on the Chickahominy, let us leave him a short time to see what has taken place elsewhere in Virginia. It will be remembered that General Butler had advanced from Fortress Monroe toward Richmond on the same day that the Army of the Potomac crossed the Rapidan (page 435). His army, thirty thousand strong, went up the James River in transports and landed at City Point and Bermuda Hundred, about twenty miles south of Richmond. From there he moved against the Richmond and Petersburg Railroad, and after some fighting destroyed part of it. He might have captured Petersburg, but misled by false reports that Lee had been defeated and was retreating toward Richmond, he made up his mind to move northward to aid Grant in taking that place. He drove back the Confederates and took part of the outer defences of Fort Darling at Drury's Bluff on the James River.

As soon as Butler's movement toward Richmond was known, General Beauregard had been called from Charleston with all the troops he could bring. On the morning of the 16th, during a dense fog, Beauregard attacked Butler, and after a hard fight, in which he lost three thousand and Butler four thousand men, the latter was forced back to Bermuda Hundred. Beauregard threw up a line of earthworks in front of Butler, who thus found himself "bottled up," as he himself said, he being unable to move either way. This enabled Beauregard to send most of his troops to the aid of Lee.