A Stillness at Appomattox (183 page)

They
might
be
victorious,
but
the
men
were
still
cagey. Midway
of
the
first
day
out,
excited
staff
officers
rode
down the
columns
shouting
the
news—Richmond
taken,
the
Union flag
flying
over
the
Confederate
capital!
The
veterans
perked up,
and
then
they
remembered
that
they
had
been
had
before.
When
an
especially
hard
march
was
to
be
made,
staff officers
often
circulated
false
announcements
of
good
tidings just
to
keep
everybody
stepping
along
briskly.
So
the
men jeered
at
each
bearer
of
good
news,
calling
out:
"Put
him
in a
canteen!
Give
him
a
hardtack!
Tell
it
to
the
recruits!"
But pretty
soon
the
bands
began
to
play,
and
the
colonels
formally announced
the
news
to
their
own
regiments,
and
up
and down
the
line
of
march
the
men
began
to
realize
that
for once
the
good
news
was
true.

"Stack
your
muskets
and
go
home!"
yelled
one
of
Ord's men,
when
General
Gibbon
announced
the
fall
of
Richmond. As
the
army
bivouacked
that
night,
one
veteran
told
another: "I
feel
better
tonight
than
I
did
after
that
fight
at
Gettysburg."

Far
out
in
front,
fantastic
outriders
of
victory,
went
Sheridan's
scouts.
Sometimes
they
rode
dressed
as
Confederate officers
or
couriers,
and
sometimes
they
wore
faded
jeans
and rode
decrepit
horses
or
mules
with
makeshift
bridles
and saddles,
pretending
to
be
displaced
farmers
or
roving
horse doctors.
Either
way,
they
visited
Rebel
picket
posts,
rode blithely
through
cavalry
cordons,
ambled
alongside
Lee's wagon
trains,
paused
to
chat
in
Confederate
camps.
Most
of them
got
back
alive,
and
they
kept
Sheridan
informed
about where
the
enemy's
people
were
and
where
they
were
going
to be
next.

As
they
did
all
of
this,
riding
under
no
man's
control,
they appear
to
have
found
unheard-of
opportunities
for
loot.
They visited
farms
and
plantations
and
collected
much
food
for themselves,
they
got
new
horses
when
they
felt
that
they needed
them,
and
(as
other
cavalrymen
reported
enviously) they
were
not
always
above
helping
themselves
to
more substantial
valuables,
taking
cash
and
jewelry
from
planters' homes
and
leaving
their
victims
quite
at
a
loss
to
say
just who
robbed
them.
⁶
They
were
a
wild,
lawless
crew,
carrying their
own
lives
and
other
people's
property
in
their
naked hands,
and
they
feared
nothing
in
particular
except
the
black scowl
of
Phil
Sheridan.

They
swarmed
all
around
the
head
of
the
cavalry
column, exploring
the
whole
network
of
country
roads
and
learning where
every
lane
and
cowpath
led.
Behind
them
came
hard columns
of
questing
cavalry,
slashing
through
to
nip
at
the flanks
of
Lee's
moving
army,
driving
Confederate
troopers off
the
roads,
harassing
the
plodding
columns
with
quick thrusts
and
then
pulling
away
fast
to
strike
again
a
mile
or two
farther
on.
Back
of
these,
in
turn,
came
Sheridan
and the
main
body
of
cavalry;
and
two
days
out
of
Five
Forks Sheridan
led
his
men
into
a
country
town
called
Jetersville, which
place
was
important
then
for
two
reasons—it
was
on
the Richmond
and
Danville
Railroad
and
Lee
and
his
army
had not
yet
reached
it.

Sheridan
sent
one
division
west
and
north
to
see
what
was to
be
seen
and
to
cause
as
much
trouble
as
possible
for
the Confederacy.
The
rest
he
led
northeast,
and
after
a
few
miles his
men
ran
into
Rebel
cavalry
patrols
and
drove
them
back. Then
Sheridan
called
a
halt
and
had
his
men
build
breastworks,
and
a
little
later
General
Griffin
came
up
with
the V
Corps
and
threw
his
men
into
line
of
battle
beside
them, and
the
rest
of
the
infantry
was
not
far
away.
Meade
himself was
coming
up,
in
an
ambulance.
He
had
taken
ill,
from indigestion
and
general
nerve
strain,
after
the
fall
of
Petersburg,
but
he
was
coming
along
with
the
army
regardless.
⁷
So here
was
the
Army
of
the
Potomac
getting
ready
to
fight
its old
antagonist,
and
for
the
first
time
in
its
history
its
battle line
was
facing
toward
the
northeast.
It
had
won
the
race and
if
Lee
was
to
go
any
farther
south
he
would
have
to
fight.

Lee's
army
was
at
Amelia
Court
House,
half
a
dozen miles
short
of
the
spot
where
Meade's
infantry
was
going
into line.
It
could
not
stay
there
because
it
had
used
up
all
of
its rations
and
there
was
nothing
in
Amelia
Court
House
for
it to
eat,
and
after
surveying
the
Yankee
line
carefully
Lee concluded
that
his
army
was
not
strong
enough
to
fight
its way
through.
Since
the
army
could
not
retreat—there
were Yankees
in
both
Richmond
and
Petersburg
now—only
one move
remained
on
the
board:
to
go
west,
cross
country,
and strike
the
western
part
of
the
Southside
Railroad.
Provisions could
be
brought
up
from
Lynchburg
by
this
line,
and
if
the army
moved
fast
and
had
luck
there
was
an
outside
chance that
it
could
still
slip
around
the
Federal
flank
and
get
south. Failing
that,
it
might
at
least
reach
Lynchburg
and
try
to survive
there
for
a
time.
There
was
nothing
else
it
could
even try
to
do.