burg works had been extended to Hatcher's run, where the Confederate right rested. It was proposed to turn this, and in the meanwhile press on to the railroad. The corps assigned to this task moved forward on the twenty-seventh of October, but the watchfulness and promptness of Lee prevented the movement from becoming a success.

The Virginia campaign was now closing for the year, and while no great apparent results had been produced, Sheridan had succeeded in proving himself of great service by his brilliant operations in the Shenandoah valley. He had stopped the onward course of Early and had won the brilliant victories of Winchester, Fisher's Hill, Tom's Brook and Cedar Creek. With that generosity that was inherent in his very nature, Grant bestowed upon his subordinate a full measure of praise, writing to him concerning the Victory at Winchester, "it has been most opportune in point of time and effect. It will open again to the government and to the public the very important line of road from Baltimore to the Ohio, and also the Chesapeake canal. Better still, it wipes out much of the stain upon our arms by previous disasters in that locality. May your good work continue is now the prayer of all loyal men." And again, after the battle of Fisher's Hill: Keep on, and your good work will cause the fall of Richmond." Amid his most trying cares and in the face of his greatest responsibilities, he ever found time and the disposition to publicly praise those soldiers who had done brilliant work, and by whose intelligent coöperation his plans had been carried into effect.

Early in 1865, even those who had criticised the military methods of Grant and made war upon him in the press, in congress and before the people, began to see that there was a mighty plan in all the operations he had been so relentlessly conducting, and that he was surely reducing the resources and narrowing down the fighting ground of the Confederacy. All the movements east and west that had seemed disconnected, now began to show their convergence to one grand result. Sherman had fought his way to Atlanta despite the stubborn resistance of Johnston and Hood; and when the army of the latter, stealing away from Sherman's front, hastened to Tennessee, Thomas had overwhelmed it at Nashville. Sherman had made his wonderful march from Atlanta to the sea, and from Savannah was now on his way through the Carolinas against Johnston, and toward Grant and his army camped about Petersburg and Richmond. Wilson and Stoneman were sweeping through Alabama and East TennesMobile, Charleston, Fort Fisher and Wilmington had fallen. Sheridan and his cavalry in the Shenandoah valley had broken the neighboring railroads and the James river canal, and was now at Grant's left, ready to perform any great and rapid work that should be demanded at his hand.

see.

The winter of 1864-5 was indeed one of question, of doubt and uncertainty on the part of many; of hope in the events of the coming year and

of faith with those who, like Lincoln and Stanton, had given their loyalty without reserve to the quiet man at the head of the Union troops. Many sharp criticisms of Grant had been heard, and there seemed to be plausibility in the charge that for months he had won no great battle and accomplished no brilliant victory. But after-events have cast a flood of light upon the scene, and we discover that each day's quiet labor was toward a given end of which he never lost sight and to which all other things were subordinate. Each small position won was but one step nearer Richmond. Grant knew, if the country did not, it was, as he afterwards declared, a question as to which side possessed the most men and the greatest resources, and that after a month's hard fighting Lee's army must be enfeebled and less and less able to hold its own. Behind Grant was the rich and generous North, while behind Lee was the impoverished Confederacy. Knowing all this he called again and again for men, and under no plea would he allow his forces to run below the desired number. Congress and the people responded loyally and generously, now that they began to understand the meaning of Grant's course, and to see the foreshadowing of the coming end. That spring of 1865 was one of deep anxiety and unceasing care to the general himself. "One of the most anxious periods of my experience during the rebellion," he confesses in his memoirs (Vol. II., page 424), "was the last few weeks before Petersburg. I felt that the situation of the Confederate army was such that they would try to make an escape at the earliest practicable moment, and I was afraid every morning that I would awake from my sleep to hear that Lee had gone, and that nothing was left but a picket line. He had his railroad by the way of Danville south, and I was afraid he was running off his men and all stores and ordnance except such as it would be necessary to carry with him for his immediate defense. I knew he could move much more lightly and more rapidly than I, and that, if he got the start, he would leave me behind, so that we would have the same army to fight again farther south -and the war might be prolonged another year. I was led to this fear by the fact that I could not see how it was possible for the Confederates to hold out much longer where they were. There is no doubt that Richmond would have been evacuated much sooner than it was, if it had not been that it was the capital of the so-called Confederacy, and the fact of evacuating the capital would, of course, have had a very demoralizing effect upon the Confederate army. For these and other reasons, I was naturally very impatient for the time to come when I could commence the spring campaign, which I thoroughly believed would close the war."

The genius of Lee had forecast the purpose of Grant, and led him to attempt the very thing that the Union commander describes in the above. He saw that his main hope of saving his army and the main prop of the Confederacy was to abandon Richmond and unite with Johnston at Dan

ville and strike Sherman with their two great armies. He attempted this. on March 25, under cover of an attack from his left against Fort Stedman. Gordon gallantly carried this work, but was driven back, the rebels suffering a loss of four thousand men, which they could ill afford, against a Union loss of two thousand. While Gordon had been making his dispositions for this attack, Grant had issued an order for a movement to commence on the twenty-ninth. General Ord, with three divisions of infantry and Mackenzie's cavalry, was to move forward on the night of the twenty-seventh from the north side of the James river, and take his place on the extreme Union left, thirty miles away. Weitzel was left with the rest of the army of the James to hold Bermuda Hundred and the north of the James river. Ord was soon in place; and upon his arrival Humphreys and Warren, who were then on the extreme left with the Second and Fifth corps, were directed to cross Hatcher's run and extend out toward Five Forks, the object in view being to get into a position from which Grant could strike the South Side railroad and, ultimately, the Danville railroad. In taking these positions the two corps were compelled to face some fighting, in which they more than held their own. Sheridan had reached City Point on March 26, and Grant immediately prepared his instructions for the movement upon which he had decided. "After reading the instructions I had given him," writes Grant, "Sheridan walked out of my tent, and I followed to have some conversation with him by himself—not in the presence of anybody, even of a member of my staff. In preparing his instructions I contemplated just what took place that is to say, capturing Five Forks, driving the enemy from Petersburg and Richmond and terminating the contest before separating from the enemy. But the Nation had already become restless and discouraged at the prolongation of the war, and many believed that it would never terminate except by compromise. Knowing that unless my plan proved an entire success it would be interpreted as a disastrous defeat, I provided in these instructions that in a certain event he was to cut loose from the Army of the Potomac and his base of supplies, and living upon the country, proceed south by the way of the Danville railroad, or near it, across the Roanoke, get in the rear of Johnston, who was guarding that road, and coöperate with Sherman in destroying Johnston; then with these combined forces to help carry out the instructions which Sherman already received, to act in coöperation with the armies around Petersburg and Richmond. I saw that after Sheridan had read his instructions he seemed somewhat disap. pointed at the idea, possibly, of having to cut loose again from the Army of the Potomac and place himself between the two main armies of the enemy. I said to him, 'General, this portion of your instructions I have put in merely as a blind,' and gave him the reason for doing so, heretofore described. I told him that, as a matter of fact, I intended to close

the war right here, with this movement, and that he should go no farther."

On March 29 Grant moved out with all his grand army, leaving only a force sufficient to hold the line about Petersburg. By the day following he had made sufficient progress to the southwest to warrant him in starting Sheridan's cavalry across to Dinwiddie, with instructions to come up by the road leading northwest to Five Forks, thus menacing the right of Lee's line. The Confederate commander fully understood Grant's desire to gain possession of his two great lines of railroad communication, the South Side and Danville, which were important to his very existence while he remained in Petersburg and Richmond, and of vital necessity to him in case he should decide to retreat. He therefore made strenuous efforts to defend them, sending General Pickett with five brigades to reinforce Five Forks. He also sent to the right of his army some two or three divisions, besides holding other troops in readiness to come over on call. He himself went to the defense of his right flank. Sheridan proceeded to Dinwiddie court-house on the night of the thirtieth, and then took a road leading to Five Forks, having only his cavalry with him. He met several bodies of rebel cavalry and drove them back. He succeeded by the middle of the afternoon of the first, in advancing to the point from which to make his designed attack upon Five Forks itself. The fight opened briskly and raged fiercely, and at dusk the gallant cavalryman and his men had possession of the parapets of the enemy. The enemy broke and ran, six thousand of them falling prisoners. The flying troops were pursued with ardor, the chase being kept up until nine at night, when Sheridan halted his troops and sent the Fifth corps across Hatcher's run to the southwest of Petersburg, and facing them toward it. Merritt and the cavalry stopped where they were, and bivouacked west of Five Forks.

In the evening Grant issued orders to Generals Wright and Parke to make an assault upon the enemy on the following morning. Generals Humphreys and Ord, with the Army of the James on the left, were directed to hold themselves in readiness to take any advantage that could be gained from the weakening of the enemy in their front. He further directed Weitzel, on the north side of the James river, to keep close up to the enemy, ready to enter the city of Richmond the moment the enemy should abandon it. At the hour named Parke and Wright moved out as directed, under a heavy fire, and halted not until they had mounted the parapets and thrown themselves inside the enemy's line. Their movement resulted in the capture of some three thousand men. In the meantime Ord and Humphreys had succeeded, at an early hour of the morning, in capturing the intrenched picket lines in their front, Ord also managing to get inside the enemy's intrenchments. The Second corps were close

behind him, and the outer works of Petersburg were at last in the hands of the Union troops. When Wright reached that point in his advance that would enable him to do it, he sent a regiment to destroy that part of the South Side railroad that lay immediately outside the city. Lee made a heroic effort to recover lost ground and save himself from future disaster. Parke was assaulted again and again, but repelled every attack. In addition to their intrenched line close by Petersburg, the enemy also possessed two enclosed works outside of it, Fort Whitworth and Fort Gregg. Grant determined to carry them by assault, and at one o'clock Foster's division of the Twenty-fourth corps, supported by two brigades from Ord's command, moved forward. The fight that ensued. was desperate and bloody, and the Union troops were again and again assaulted; but their effort was at last crowned with success and the stars and stripes waved triumphantly over Gregg. The rebels immediately abandoned Fort Whitworth, and the Union troops took quiet possession. Grant had ordered General Miles in the morning to report to Sheridan. In doing so he came upon the enemy, who fell back to Sutherland station on the South Side road. As he attacked on one side Sheridan came up on the other, and the result was the capture of the place with a large number of prisoners and some pieces of artillery. The situation on the evening of this busy and memorable day can be best given in the dispatch with which General Grant described his operations and their result to the anxious President, who was waiting for news at City Point:

"BOYDTON ROAD, NEAR PETERSBURG, April 2, 1865, 4:40 P. M.

COLONEL T. S. BOWERS, City Point:

We are now up and have a continuous line of troops and in a few hours will be intrenched from the Appomattox below Petersburg to the river above. Heth's and Wilcox's divisions, such parts of them as were not captured, were cut off from town, either designedly on their part or because they could not help it. Sheridan with the cavalry and Fifth corps is above

them.

Miles' division, Second corps, was sent from the White Oak road to Sutherland station on the South Side railroad, where he met them, and at last accounts was engaged with them. Not knowing whether Sheridan would get up in time, General Humphreys was sent with another division from here. The whole captures since the army started out gunning will amount to not less than twelve thousand men and probably fifty pieces of artillery. I do not know the number of men and guns accurately, however

I think the President might come out and pay us a visit to-morrow. U. S. GRANT, Lieutenant-General." During the night that followed the Union line was intrenched from the river above to the river below. Grant ordered a bombardment to be commenced at five o'clock of the morning of the third, to be followed by an