A Stillness at Appomattox (67 page)

Reinforcements
were
coming.
Down
on
the
James
River Butler's
army
was
huddling
ingloriously
in
its
haven
at
Bermuda
Hundred,
and
Grant
had
notified
Butler
that
if
he could
not
fight
there
he
could
at
least
send
some
of
his
men up
to
help
the
Army
of
the
Potomac.
So
General
Baldy Smith
put
16,000
men
on
transports
and
took
them
down the
James,
around
Point
Comfort,
and
up
the
Pamunkey
to White
House.
He
was
under
orders
to
get
down
to
Cold Harbor
as
fast
as
he
could,
and
he
should
have
reached
the place
while
Sheridan's
fight
was
going
on,
but
there
had
been a
mixup
in
his
orders
and
he
made
a
wearing,
useless
march up
the
river
before
higher
authority
caught
up
with
him and
put
him
on
the
right
track.
Late
in
the
afternoon
of June
1,
Smith's
men
came
down
to
the
crossroads
by
the tavern
and
began
to
file
into
line
on
the
right
of
the VI
Corps—very
tired,
short
of
ammunition
and
artillery, with
a
great
many
stragglers
wandering
about
on
the
lost roads
somewhere
off
to
the
rear.
⁷

The
plain
was
covered
with
dust
raised
by
the
marching men,
and
the
dust
hung
in
the
air
like
a
gritty
cloud
bank.
The artillery
began
to
hammer
at
the
Confederate
works,
half
a mile
away,
and
the
smoke
mingled
with
the
dust
and
the setting
sun
looked
dull-red
and
enormous
through
the
haze. As
the
reinforcements
moved
in,
Wright's
men
roused
themselves
reluctantly.
A
Connecticut
soldier
tugged
the
arm
of a
sleeping
comrade
and
told
him:
"Jim,
there's
a
pile
of
troops coming.
I
guess
there's
going
to
be
a
fight."
Jim
blinked
and declared:
"I
don't
care
a
damn.
I
wish
they'd
shoot
us
and be
done
with
it.
I'd
rather
be
shot
than
marched
to
death."
⁸

It
was
remembered
later
that
the
men
seemed
stupid with
weariness
as
they
formed
line
of
battle,
and
the
feverish
excitement
that
often
ran
through
a
body
of
men
lining up
for
a
charge
was
missing.
The
road
from
Cold
Harbor toward
Richmond
led
off
between
fields
and
little
plots
of woodland
toward
the
rising
ground
where
the
Rebels
were waiting,
and
the
road
served
as
the
guide
line
for
the
attack, with
Wright's
troops
on
the
left
of
it
and
Smith's
on
the right.
The
men
got
under
way
at
last,
and
where
the
ground began
to
rise
they
came
on
the
entanglement
of
felled
trees and
sharpened
saplings
which
the
Rebels
had
put
thirty yards
in
front
of
their
firing
line.
As
the
Federals
began
to tear
this
apart
the
Southern
riflemen
opened
fire
with
one long,
rolling
volley—"a
sheet
of
flame,
sudden
as
lightning, red
as
blood,
and
so
near
that
it
seemed
to
singe
the men's
faces,"
one
survivor
described
it.
Up
and
down
the front
of
the
two
army
corps
the
attacking
lines
wavered,
and here
and
there
men
turned
and
ran
for
the
rear.
Then
the lines
surged
forward
again,
and
on
the
slopes
near
the
Richmond
road
Ricketts's
division
and
some
of
Smith's
men
broke into
the
Rebel
works,
taking
prisoners
and
sending
the
rest of
the
defenders
flying.

Ricketts's
men
were
out
to
redeem
themselves.
They
were Milroy's
weary
boys
from
the
valley,
the
ones
who
had broken
and
fled
in
panic
in
the
Wilderness
fight,
and
the rest
of
the
VI
Corps
had
let
them
know
that
they
were accounted
second-rate
soldiers
not
worthy
of
belonging
to a
good
fighting
corps.
Ricketts
had
been
nursing
them
along ever
since,
and
he
seems
to
have
pulled
them
together
and made
soldiers
out
of
them,
and
on
this
evening
their
division
was
the
only
unit
in
the
VI
Corps
that
gained
its
objective.
To
right
and
left
the
Confederate
line
held
firm,
and as
the
evening
deepened
into
a
wild
twilight
there
was
a furious
fire
fight.

Emory
Upton
had
his
brigade
up
close
to
the
enemy,
as usual—he
had
just
learned
that
he
was
being
promoted brigadier
general
because
of
his
feat
at
Spotsylvania—and in
line
with
the
gospel
he
had
been
preaching
he
was
on
the firing
line
personally,
helping
his
men
to
beat
off
a
sharp Rebel
counterattack.
One
of
his
regiments,
the
2nd
Connecticut
Heavy
Artillery,
began
to
waver,
and
Upton
galloped into
the
middle
of
it,
shouting:
"Men
of
Connecticut,
stand by
me!
We
must
hold
this
line!"
The
wavering
stopped
and the
regiment
held,
and
one
soldier
remembered
seeing
Upton,
dismounted,
standing
in
the
front
rank
firing
an
infantry musket.
When
one
disheartened
officer
came
up
to
report that
he
did
not
think
his
command
could
drive
the
Rebels back,
Upton
snarled
at
him:
"If
they
come
there,
catch
them on
your
bayonets
and
pitch
them
over
your
heads!"
⁹