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Siege of Petersburg

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Siege of Petersburg Seige Of Petersburg June 9th 1864 - March 25th 1865 Siege Of Petersburg Butler”s assault (June 9) While Lee and Grant faced each other after Cold Harbor, Benjamin Butler became aware that Confederate troops had been moving north to reinforce Lee, leaving the defenses of Petersburg in a vulnerable state. Sensitive to his failure in the Bermuda Hundred Campaign, Butler sought to achieve a success to vindicate his generalship. He wrote, "the capture of Petersburg lay near my heart." Petersburg was protected by multiple lines of fortifications, the outermost of which was known as the Dimmock Line, a line of earthworks 10 miles (16 km) long, east of the city. The 2,500 Confederates stretched thin along this defensive line were commanded by a former Virginia governor, Brig. Gen. Henry A. Wise. Butler”s plan was formulated on the afternoon of June 8, 1864, calling for three columns to cross the Appomattox and advance with 4,500 men. The first and second consisted of infantry from Maj. Gen. Quincy A. Gillmore”s X Corps and U.S. Colored Troops from Brig. Gen. Edward W. Hinks”s 3rd Division of XVIII Corps, which would attack the Dimmock Line east of the city. The third was 1,300 cavalrymen under Brig. Gen. August Kautz, who would sweep around Petersburg and strike it from the southeast. The troops moved out on the night of June 8, but made poor progress. Eventually the infantry crossed by 3:40 a.m. on June 9 and by 7 a.m., both Gillmore and Hinks had encountered the enemy, but stopped at their fronts. Gillmore told Hinks that he would attack but that both of the infantry columns should await the cavalry assault from the south. Kautz”s men did not arrive until noon, however, having been delayed en route by numerous enemy pickets. They assaulted the Dimmock Line where it crossed the Jerusalem Plank Road (present-day U.S. Route 301, Crater Road). The Confederates” Battery 27, also known as Rives”s Salient, was manned by 150 militiamen commanded by Maj. Fletcher H. Archer. Kautz first launched a probing attack, then paused. His main attack was by the 11th Pennsylvania Cavalry against the Home Guard, a group consisting primarily of teenagers, elderly men, and some wounded soldiers from city hospitals. The Home Guards retreated to the city with heavy losses, but by this time Beauregard had been able to bring reinforcements from Richmond to bear, which were able to repulse the Federal assault. Kautz, hearing no activity on Gillmore”s front, presumed that he was left on his own and withdrew. Confederate casualties were about 80, Federal 40. Butler was furious with Gillmore”s timidity and incompetence and arrested him. Gillmore requested a court of inquiry, which was never convened, but Grant later reassigned him and the incident was dropped. Meade”s assaults (June 15–18) Inexplicably, Grant selected Butler”s Army of the James, which had performed poorly in the Bermuda Hundred Campaign, to lead the expedition toward Petersburg. On June 14 he directed Butler to augment the XVIII Corps, commanded by Brig. Gen. William F. "Baldy" Smith, to a strength of 16,000 men, including Kautz”s cavalry division, and use the same route employed in the unsuccessful attacks of June 9. Since Beauregard had insufficient men available to defend the entire Dimmock Line, he concentrated 2,200 troops under Brig. Gen. Henry A. Wise in the northeastern sector. Even with his concentration, infantrymen were spaced an unacceptable 10 feet (3.0 m) apart. His remaining 3,200 men were facing Butler”s army at Bermuda Hundred. Baldy Smith and his men crossed the Appomattox shortly after dawn on June 15. Kautz”s cavalry, leading the advance, encountered an unexpected stronghold at Baylor”s farm northeast of Petersburg. Brig. Gen. Edward W. Hinks”s men launched two attacks on the Confederates and captured a cannon, but the overall advance was delayed until early afternoon. Smith started his attack after delaying until about 7 p.m., deploying a strong skirmish line that swept over the earthworks on a 3.5-mile (5.6 km) front, causing the Confederates to retreat to a weaker defensive line on Harrison”s Creek. Despite this initial success and the prospect of a virtually undefended city immediately to his front, Smith decided to wait until dawn to resume his attack. By this time Maj. Gen. Winfield S. Hancock, the II Corps commander, had arrived at Smith”s headquarters. The normally decisive and pugnacious Hancock, who outranked Smith, was uncertain of his orders and the disposition of forces, and uncharacteristically deferred to Smith”s judgment to wait. Beauregard wrote later that Petersburg "at that hour was clearly at the mercy of the Federal commander, who had all but captured it." But he used the time he had been granted to good advantage. Receiving no guidance from Richmond in response to his urgent requests, he unilaterally decided to strip his defenses from the Howlett Line, which was bottling up Butler”s army in Bermuda Hundred, making the divisions of Maj. Gens. Robert Hoke and Bushrod Johnson available for the new Petersburg defensive line. Butler might have used this opportunity to move his army between Petersburg and Richmond, which would have doomed the Confederate capital, but he once again failed to act. By the morning of June 16, Beauregard had concentrated about 14,000 men in his defensive line, but this paled in comparison to the 50,000 federals that now faced him. Grant had arrived with Maj. Gen. Ambrose Burnside IX Corps, addressed the confusion of Hancock”s orders, and ordered a reconnaissance for weak points in the defensive line. Hancock, in temporary command of the Army of the Potomac until Maj. Gen. George G. Meade arrived, prepared Smith”s XVIII corps on the right, his own II Corps in the center, and Burnside”s IX Corps on the left. Hancock”s assault began around 5:30 p.m. as all three corps moved slowly forward. Beauregard”s men fought fiercely, erecting new breastworks to the rear as breakthroughs occurred. Upon the arrival of General Meade, a second attack was ordered and Brig. Gen. Francis C. Barlow led his division forward. Although Barlow”s men managed to capture their objectives, a counterattack drove them back, taking numerous Federal prisoners. The survivors dug in close to the enemy works. June 17 was a day of uncoordinated Federal attacks, starting on the left flank where two brigades of Burnside”s IX Corps under Brig. Gen. Robert B. Potter stealthily approached the Confederate line and launched a surprise attack at dawn. Initially successful, it captured nearly a mile of the Confederate fortifications and about 600 prisoners, but the effort eventually failed when Potter”s men moved forward to find another line of entrenchments. IX Corps assaults at 2 p.m., led by the brigade of Brig. Gen. John F. Hartranft, and in the evening, by Brig. Gen. James H. Ledlie”s division, both failed. During the day, Beauregard”s engineers had laid out new defensive positions a mile to the west of the Dimmock Line, which the Confederates occupied late that night. Robert E. Lee had systematically ignored all of Beauregard”s pleas for reinforcements until now, but dispatched two divisions of his men, exhausted from the Overland Campaign, to Petersburg, beginning at 3 a.m. on June 18. With the arrival of Lee”s two divisions, under Maj. Gen. Joseph B. Kershaw and Charles W. Field, Beauregard had over 20,000 men to defend the city, but Grant”s force had been augmented by the arrival of Maj. Gen. Gouverneur K. Warren”s V Corps and 67,000 Federals were present. The first Federal attack began at dawn, started by the II and XVIII Corps on the Federal right. The II Corps was surprised to make rapid progress against the Confederate line, not realizing that Beauregard had moved it back the night before. When they encountered the second line, the attack immediately ground to a halt and the corps suffered under heavy Confederate fire for hours. At noon on Jun 18, Maj. Gen. Orlando B. Willcox”s division of the IX Corps led a renewed attack but it suffered significant losses in the marsh and open fields crossed by Taylor”s Branch. Warren”s V Corps was halted by murderous fire from Rives”s Salient, an attack in which Col. Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain of the 20th Maine was severely wounded. At 6:30 p.m., Meade ordered a final assault, which also failed with more horrendous losses. One of the leading regiments was the 1st Maine Heavy Artillery, which lost 632 of 900 men in the assault, the heaviest single-battle loss of any regiment during the entire war. Having achieved almost no gains from four days of assaults, Meade ordered his army to dig in, starting the ten-month siege. Federal casualties were 11,386 (1,688 killed, 8,513 wounded, 1,185 missing or captured), Confederate 4,000 (200 killed, 2,900 wounded, 900 missing or captured). Initial attempts to cut the railroads (June 21–30) After failing to capture Petersburg by assault, Grant”s first objective was secure the three remaining open rail lines that served Petersburg and Richmond: the Richmond and Petersburg Railroad; the South Side Railroad, which reached to Lynchburg in the west; and the Weldon Railroad, also called the Petersburg and Weldon Railroad, which led to Weldon, North Carolina, and the Confederacy”s only remaining major port, Wilmington, North Carolina. Grant decided on a wide-ranging cavalry raid (the Wilson-Kautz Raid) against the South Side and Weldon railroads, but he also directed that a significant infantry force be sent against the Weldon closer to his current position.
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