be waged, and they supposed Butler would remain idle until the Army of the Potomac was repulsed. On the sixth, General Butler had his army well in hand at the two points named, and, instead of advancing any farther, began to intrench. On the ninth, he telegraphed to Secretary Stanton, that he had reached the points designated, and that he had "got a position, which, with proper supplies, we can hold out against the whole of Lee's army." General Grant's view of this Falstaffian strategy is expressed in these words: "His army, therefore, though in a position of great security, was as completely shut off from further operations directly against Richmond, as if it had been in a bottle strongly corked. It required but a comparatively small force of the enemy to hold it there. Farther on he says: "The army sent to operate against Richmond having hermetically sealed itself up at Bermuda Hundred, the enemy was enabled to bring most, if not all the re-enforcements brought from the South by Beauregard, against the Army of the Potomac." And Butler and his army remained corked up until the Army of the Potomac crossed the James and uncorked the bottle, the fifteenth of June. On the night of the twenty-sixth of May the order again passed along the Union lines, "By the left flank -March!" During the twenty-ninth and thirtieth, the army advanced under heavy skirmishing to Hanover Court House and Cold Harbor. At the latter place the fighting was almost continuous, and often desperate, until the night of the twelfth, when the army again moved by the left, and crossing the James River at Wilcox's Landing, moved up on the south side of the stream. The march from the Rapidan to the James had been attended by a series of battles and skirmishes that had strewn the route with the corpses of thousands of men, much the greater number of whom wore the Union 1864.] LOSSES ON THE WAY. 483 blue. Except in the battle of the Wilderness, the Federals were the assailants, and their losses on this long battle-field amounted to the frightful number of 54,551, killed, wounded and missing. CHAPTER XXXVI. IN FRONT OF PETERSBURG-THE MINE-THE FUSE GOES OUT-LIEUTENANT DOUTY AND SERGEANT REES RE-LIGHT IT-THE MINE EXPLODESLEDLIE'S DIVISION IN THE CRATER-TROOPS WITHDRAWN-HEAVY LOSS-WOMEN OF PETERSBURG-DEMORALIZATION OF LEE'S ARMY-HE DESIGNS TO RETREAT-ASSAULTS FORT STEADMAN-CARRIES IT AND IS DRIVEN OUT-HEAVY LOSS-THE RIGHT ON THE CONFEDERATE WORKS CARRIED-FEDERALS CAPTURE GUNS AND PRISONERS CONFEDERATES DRIVEN TO THEIR INNER LINE-THEY RETREAT-A PETERSBURGER'S ACCOUNT OF THE LAST SCENES. ON the 18th of June the army drew up in front of Petersburg. Here manœuvres, attack and counterattack, consumed the summer, and thousands perished in the fierce conflicts that raged around the "Cockade City." The enemy's lines were very strong, and were defended with unwavering courage and indomitable resolution. It was the last strategical point between the Union army and the rebel capital. Even now the roar of artillery rolled in ominous murmurs over the city of Richmond. But the lines could not be broken by direct attack. Colonel Henry Pleasants, of the Forty-eighth Pennsylvania, of Burnside's corps, proposed to run a mine under the rebel works in front of his (Pleasants') position, and blow them up. General Burnside approved of the plan, and the work began on the 25th of June. It had to be carried on with great secresy, and was of herculean proportions. One of the difficulties was to dispose of the immense quantities of earth excavated, that it might not lead the enemy to suspect the plot. The main gallery was 511 feet long, and was carried directly under a rebel battery. From this extended lateral galleries, right |