Lees Last Retreat: The Flight to Appomattox (Civil War America)

Appomattox Court House Virginia

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Miles was convinced he could defeat Heth's force, which was now under the command of Brigadier General John R. Cooke because Heth had been called to Petersburg to take charge of A. Hill's corps due to Hill's death. Madill 's brigade to attack Cooke's and Hyman's Galloway's positions. The Union attackers captured prisoners, two guns and a battle flag. When McGowan's men finally gave way, Cooke's brigades collapsed from east to west although Cooke's own brigade was farthest from the end of the line and withdrew in better order than the other survivors who managed to escape.

Union troops also occupied Petersburg. Lieutenant General Grant and President Lincoln met at a private home. Jubilant African-Americans surrounded him on his walk. Lincoln conferred with Major General Weitzel, talked with former U.

Confederate forces headed for a rendezvous point at Amelia Court House with Union forces pursuing, mostly on parallel routes. Custer's younger brother, Captain Tom Custer , spurred his horse over a hastily thrown up barricade of the still deploying Confederate cavalry and captured 3 Confederate officers and 11 enlisted men, as well as the battle flag of the 2nd North Carolina Cavalry, for which he received the Medal of Honor. Brigadier General Barringer and many of his men were captured by Sheridan's scouts who were wearing gray uniforms and led Barringer and his remaining men into a trap.

Total Confederate losses are not known, but Custer's men were able to capture many Confederates. The Union cavalrymen took prisoners, horses and an artillery piece while initially clearing the road as far as the Namozine Church. Johnson reported 15 wounded from his division. By the evening of April 3, most of Longstreet's troops had crossed to the west side of the Appomattox River over Goode's Bridge while Gordon's men were east of the bridge. On the line of march west toward the Confederate Army's rendezvous point of Amelia Court House on Bevill's Bridge Road, Lieutenant General Anderson had the remaining men of George Pickett's and Bushrod Johnson's divisions build earthworks and form a line of battle at Tabernacle Church Road to protect the forces in retreat from attack from the pursuing Union forces to their south.

An advance party of Major General George Crook's division reached the important railroad intersection of Burkeville Junction, Virginia by 3: Lee had expected to find rations for the army at Amelia Court House but found only an inadequate stockpile of rations and a trainload of ordnance. The extra equipment was to be sent by a circuitous route to the north with the weaker animals, sent by rail or destroyed.

Davies began to return to Jetersville after burning many of Confederate wagons including headquarters wagons, capturing horses, mules and some artillery pieces, and taking prisoners, at Paineville or Paine's Cross Roads. Rosser and Colonel Thomas T. Munford assaulted the Union cavalry on their return, starting a running fight from north of Amelia Springs to within 1 mile 1.

Smith provided reinforcements, allowing Davies's force to reach Jetersville with their prisoners, guns and teams. Crook's cavalry division had casualties of 13 killed, 81 wounded and 72 missing and probably taken prisoner in three encounters during the day. Fitzhugh Lee said he counted 30 dead Union soldiers along the way. Starting to move his army toward Jetersville at 1: His only remaining option was to move west on a long march, without food, to Lynchburg. A skirmish took place at Flat Creek, near Amelia Springs, on April 6 as the armies began to engage in fighting leading up to the Battle of Sailor's Creek.

When General Robert E. Lee discovered that his route to Danville was blocked at Jetersville, he knew his army had to make another night march to Farmville. As it developed, the Battle of Sailor's Creek was actually three engagements fought in close proximity at about the same time.

Ewell's corps at the Hillsman House. After a running battle over several miles, Major General Andrew A. Gordon's corps at Lockett's Farm. At Sailor's Creek, between one-fifth and one-fourth of the remaining retreating Confederate army was taken prisoner or became casualties about 8, men, with about 7, men taken prisoner, including most of Richard S.

Ewell's corps and about half of Richard H. Kershaw , and Brigadier Generals Seth M. Barton , James P. Simms , Dudley M. Upon returning to the scene near the end of the battle with Major General William Mahone's division, and from a bluff across Sailor's Creek seeing the disorganization on the field and survivors streaming along the road, Lee exclaimed "My God, has the army dissolved?

Will you please keep those people back? The Battle of Rice's Station was a minor engagement in that was fought at the same time as the Battle of Sailor's Creek on April 6, As Longstreet's corps was the first to reach Rice's Station after Lee moved his army west from Amelia Springs, Virginia, they awaited the remainder of the army.

Appomattox Campaign

With the Union Army nearby after the disastrous Confederate defeat at Sailor's Creek, under General Lee's order, Longstreet withdrew during the night towards Farmville, Virginia where rations were waiting. At the first Battle of High Bridge on April 6, , Confederates stopped a large Union raiding party from burning High Bridge before Confederates south of the Appomattox River could pass over it to the north side. The Confederates took at least Union survivors as prisoners. Union Colonel Brevet Brigadier General Theodore Read was killed, possibly in a pistol shootout with Confederate Colonel James Dearing often identified as a brigadier general but his appointment was never confirmed [] [] , who was also mortally wounded in the encounter.

On April 7, , at the second Battle of High Bridge, after the bulk of Lee's remaining army crossed the Appomattox River, Longstreet's rear guard burned the bridges behind them.

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The Union II Corps managed to extinguish the blazes on two of the bridges, and they crossed the river and caught up with the Confederates at Farmville. Fitzhugh Lee's cavalry was able to hold off the Union infantry until nightfall, but Lee was forced to continue his march to the west under this pressure, depriving his men the opportunity to eat the Farmville rations they had waited so long to receive. Longstreet's Confederate forces held off the Union Army advance near Farmville, crossed the Appomattox River and continued their retreat on the north side of the river.

On the night of April 7, Lee received from Grant then headquartered at Farmville a letter proposing that the Army of Northern Virginia should surrender. Lee demurred, retaining one last hope that his army could get to Appomattox Station before he was trapped. He returned a noncommittal letter asking about the surrender terms Grant might propose.

The Union forces attacked twice but were repulsed, and darkness halted the conflict. Union Brigadier General Thomas A. Custer captured and burned three trains loaded with provisions for Lee's army. Grant sent a letter to Lee offering generous surrender terms, as urged by President Abraham Lincoln , and proposing a meeting to discuss them. With rations and supplies destroyed, Lee's last hope was to outmarch the Union pursuers to Lynchburg where there were more rations and supplies. Some food was still available in the remaining wagons and it was distributed to the units as they arrived in the vicinity of Appomattox Court House, Walker's artillery first, then Gordon's infantry, and the rest of army.

Gordon attacked units of Major General Philip Sheridan's cavalry. Mackenzie's smaller division from the Army of the James, slowed the Confederate advance. Foster's division and suffered significant casualties in this final fight. Gordon gave him a reply he knew Lee did not want to hear: In accordance with the substance of my letter to you of the 8th inst. Rolls of all the officers and men to be made in duplicate. One copy to be given to an officer designated by me, the other to be retained by such officer or officers as you may designate.

The officers to give their individual paroles not to take up arms against the Government of the United States until properly exchanged, and each company or regimental commander sign a like parole for the men of their commands. The arms, artillery and public property to be parked and stacked, and turned over to the officer appointed by me to receive them. This will not embrace the side-arms of the officers, nor their private horses or baggage.

This done, each officer and man will be allowed to return to their homes, not to be disturbed by United States authority so long as they observe their paroles and the laws in force where they may reside. The terms were as generous as Lee could hope for; his men would not be imprisoned or prosecuted for treason. Officers were allowed to keep their sidearms. Parker , a Native American of the Seneca tribe, and completed around 4 p.

Battle of Appomattox Court House

The Appomattox Campaign was an example of masterful, relentless pursuit and maneuver by Grant and Sheridan, skills that had been in short supply by previous generals, such as Meade after Gettysburg and McClellan after Antietam. Lee did the best he could under the circumstances, but his supplies, soldiers, and luck finally ran out. The surrender of Lee represented the loss of only one of the Confederate field armies, but it was a psychological blow from which the South did not recover. With no chance remaining for eventual victory, all of the remaining armies capitulated by June Confederate casualties in the campaign are difficult to estimate because many of their records are lost and reports were not always submitted.

National Park Service historian Chris M. Calkins estimates 6, killed and wounded, 19, captured; surrendering at Appomattox Court House were 22, infantry, 1, cavalry, and 2, artillery troops. Many men who had slipped away from the army during the retreat later returned to receive the official Federal paperwork allowing them to return to their homes unmolested. Military historians do not agree on precise boundaries between the campaigns of this era.

This article uses the classification maintained by the U. An alternative classification is maintained by West Point ; in their Atlas of American Wars Esposito, , the Siege of Petersburg ends with the Union assault and breakthrough of April 2. From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. Grant and Robert E. Lee , opposing commanders in the Appomattox Campaign. Battle of Hatcher's Run.

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Battle of Fort Stedman. Appomattox Campaign Union order of battle. Appomattox Campaign Confederate order of battle. Battle of Lewis's Farm. Battle of White Oak Road. Battle of Dinwiddie Court House. Battle of Five Forks. Third Battle of Petersburg. Battle of Sutherland's Station. Battle of Namozine Church. Battle of Amelia Springs.

Battle of Sailor's Creek.

Battle of Rice's Station. Battle of High Bridge. Battle of Cumberland Church. Battle of Appomattox Station.

General Robert E. Lee Surrenders to General Ulysses S. Grant

Lee had the interior line. Hess considers the Union Army offensive at the end of March and beginning of April , which brought success with the crushing of the extended Confederate right flank at the Battle of Five Forks on April 1, as the eighth offensive. Davis declined, noting the failure of a recent peace effort at the Hampton Roads Conference. He also did not want to abandon Richmond. This meeting confirmed to Lee that the Confederate Army must fight.

Hyde made no report but historian A. Wilson Greene says they must have suffered as many casualties as Lewis Grant's brigade. Only one Confederate regiment reported four wounded while a member of another regiment reported one killed and three wounded in his regiment. Others made no report, which does not mean they suffered no casualties. Buffington of the 6th Maryland Infantry Regiment was the first man from the brigade over the works. Seymour claimed that Keifer's men were the first into the Confederate line, although he later only said that Buffington was the first man over the works from his division.

Buffington was awarded the Medal of Honor in Bloodbath at Petersburg's Fort Gregg on April 2, Angle Valley Press, Scott's brigade had not been committed to the battle and was relatively fresh. The Battles of Sailor's Creek. The references by Kennedy and Salmon also use this classification.

The Calkins reference uses it for the Appomattox Campaign. Other references typically do not explicitly establish precise dates. The Appomattox Campaign, March 29 — April 9, Chapter 4 in Bearss, Edward C. The Western Front Battles. El Dorado Hills, CA, In the Trenches at Petersburg: University of North Carolina Press, A Great Civil War: A Military and Political History, — Indiana University Press, Strategy and the U.

Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, How the North Won: A Military History of the Civil War. University of Illinois Press, Why the South Lost the Civil War. University of Georgia Press, Petersburg, Virginia, June — April Louisiana State University Press, The Siege at Petersburg.

The Final Battles of the Petersburg Campaign: Breaking the Backbone of the Rebellion. University of Tennessee Press, The Cavalry at Appomattox: The Last Days of the Confederate Government. The Flight to Appomattox. The Civil War Day by Day: Retrieved February 10, In the Hands of Providence: Chamberlain and the American Civil War. University of North Carolina Press,, The Army of the Potomac and the Army of the James. Charles Scribners' Sons, Retrieved March 5, Little, Brown and Company, Battle Cry of Freedom: The Civil War Era. Oxford History of the United States.

Heidler and Jeanne T. The Union Cavalry in the Civil War: The War in the East from Gettysburg to Appomattox, — Nine April Days, Eastern Acorn Press reprint, First published New York: White , 37th Massachusetts Infantry or Pvt. Eicher , Civil War High Commands. Stanford University Press, The Month That Saved America. June — April Retrieved February 11, Bibliography of Ulysses S. El Dorado Hills, CA: West Point Atlas of American Wars. Hattaway, Herman, and Archer Jones. The Civil War Battlefield Guide.

Personal Memoirs of U. Personal Memoirs of P. War Department, The War of the Rebellion: Government Printing Office, — Guide to the Richmond—Petersburg Campaign. University Press of Kansas, A Stillness at Appomattox. Doubleday and Company, To the Bitter End: Appomattox, Bennett Place, and the Surrenders of the Confederacy.

Emerging Civil War Series. Links to related articles. Eastern Theater of the American Civil War. Fort Sumter 1st Bull Run. James Potomac Virginia Shenandoah. Combatants Theaters Campaigns Battles States.

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