A Stillness at Appomattox (85 page)

Probably
no
campaign
in
all
the
war
was
as
badly
mishandled
as
that
of
the
Army
of
the
James
in
the
spring
of 1864.
While
Grant
was
coming
down
through
the
Wilderness and
Spotsylvania,
Butler
was
taking
his
army
up
the
James
to menace
Richmond
from
the
south.
He
could
have
walked
in and
occupied
Petersburg
then
almost
without
opposition,
but apparently
the
idea
did
not
appeal
to
him.
Instead
he
wandered
around
the
country,
started
for
Petersburg
and
then turned
back,
lunged
ineffectively
toward
Richmond,
and wound
up
by
letting
a
much
smaller
Confederate
army
lock him
up
in
the
formless
peninsula
of
Bermuda
Hundred-James
River
on
the
north
and
east,
Appomattox
on
the
south, and
stout
Rebel
entrenchments
running
completely
across
the neck.
³

When
Smith
was
ordered
to
take
his
army
corps
away
from there
and
help
the
Army
of
the
Potomac
at
Cold
Harbor,
he went
gladly,
figuring
that
the
fewer
troops
Butler
commanded,
the
less
harm
was
likely
to
result.
But
he
found
his reception
in
the
clique-ridden
Army
of
the
Potomac
lacking
in warmth,
and
he
was
bitterly
critical
of
the
way
Meade
was running
things,
and
when
he
brought
his
troops
back
to
Bermuda
Hundred
he
was
not
in
a
happy
frame
of
mind.
⁴

At
Bermuda
Hundred,
however,
new
orders
awaited
him. Grant
made
a
quick
trip
to
see
Butler,
to
outiine
the
new campaign
plans
in
person,
and
when
Smith
got
his
men
off the
transports
he
was
told
to
take
them
over
to
the
south
side of
the
Appomattox
and
march
on
Petersburg
without
delay. Petersburg,
he
was
informed,
was
held
by
a
skeleton
force and
if
he
moved
fast
he
could
seize
it,
and
the
Army
of
the Potomac
would
follow
to
provide
all
necessary
reinforcements.
Smith's
corps
was
badly
thinned
down—it
had
had heavy
losses
at
Cold
Harbor,
there
had
been
a
great
deal
of straggling,
and
one
division
was
to
be
left
at
Bermuda
Hundred—and
to
bring
him
up
to
strength
he
was
allotted
a
slim division
of
colored
troops
commanded
by
Brigadier
General Edward
W.
Hinks.

These
colored
soldiers
had
been
occupying
City
Point,
a little
steamboat
landing
on
a
low
promontory
on
the
south bank
of
the
Appomattox
at
the
point
where
that
river
flowed into
the
James.
They
had
not
yet
been
in
any
serious
action, and
most
of
the
generals
took
it
for
granted
that
colored
men would
not
make
good
soldiers,
but
Grant
was
in
a
hurry
and there
was
no
time
to
wait.
So
early
on
the
morning
of
June
15 Smith's
men
crossed
the
Appomattox
on
a
pontoon
bridge
a mile
or
two
above
City
Point,
picked
up
Hinks's
soldiers,
and set
out
for
Petersburg.
Altogether
there
were
perhaps
10,000 men
in
the
united
column.

By
an
air
line
Petersburg
was
eight
miles
to
the
west.
The ground
was
broken,
with
a
series
of
north-and-south
ridges coming
down
to
the
Appomattox,
and
the
city
might
not
be too
easy
to
capture.
If
the
Confederates
could
not
spare
many men
for
its
defense,
they
had
had
plenty
of
time
and
abundant
slave
labor
to
fortify
it,
and
a
great
semicircle
of
elaborate
defenses
ran
all
around
it,
starting
in
low
ground
by the
Appomattox
two
miles
east
of
town,
cutting
south
in
a great
horseshoe
curve,
and
coming
up
to
the
river
again
on the
west.
A
few
determined
men
could
make
these
defenses very
formidable,
and
after
their
experience
at
Cold
Harbor Smith
and
his
men
were
likely
to
be
cautious
when
they
saw Rebel
trenches.
Nevertheless,
as
the
corps
marched
westward,
raising
an
enormous
cloud
of
dust
and
brushing
Southern
skirmishers
out
of
the
way,
Smith
was
approaching
one of
the
brightest
opportunities
an
ambitious
general
could
ask.

For
the
matter
of
that
so
was
the
Army
of
the
Potomac, which
was
getting
over
to
the
south
bank
of
the
James
as
fast as
it
could,
by
pontoon
bridge
and
by
steamboat,
in
order
to follow
in
his
footsteps.

Never
had
the
army
been
in
a
better
strategic
position
than it
was
getting
into
on
this
fifteenth
of
June.
Behind
it
were six
weeks
of
the
worst
campaigning
anybody
had
ever
imagined,
but
all
that
had
been
endured
might
be
justified
by what
lay
just
ahead.
The
army
now
was
squarely
in
the
rear of
its
opponent,
the
Army
of
Northern
Virginia,
which
was still
holding
its
trenches
around
Malvern
Hill
and
Glendale, prepared
to
defend
itself
against
an
attack
that
was
not
going to
take
place.
Grant
had
taken
the
army
entirely
out
of
Lee's reach,
and
in
a
few
hours
he
would
be
able
to
strike
where his
enemy
could
not
make
an
effective
defense.
Conclusive victory
lay
just
ahead.