mander, General Finnegan, retreated in a westerly direction, and established himself at Lake City, on the Florida Central Railway. Gillmore shortly afterwards returned to Hilton Head, South Carolina, and General Seymour, whom he left in his place, with directions to maintain a strictly defensive attitude, imprudently undertook an expedition against Lake City. For this enterprise no proper provision had been made, and its termination was such as might reasonably have been anticipated. Finnegan was attacked in a swamp some fifteen miles from the town; but, after a contest of four hours, the Federals were driven back with great loss, and compelled to retire behind St. Mary's River. The Northerners could now do nothing more, as regarded Florida, than hold the stations on the coast; and the interior of the State continued for a long while free from invasion, and even from active menace.

Some misfortunes also attended the Federals in North Carolina. General Pickett, with two brigades of Southerners, threatened the enemy at Newbern about the commencement of February, and captured a large part of a Vermont regiment, stationed to guard the railway between Newbern and Beaufort. He then retired to Kingston, carrying with him several prisoners, and a large amount of Government stores. The capture of Plymouth, situated on the south bank of the Roanoke, about eight miles from its mouth, and held for a long time past by 2,400 Federals, was a more serious matter. General Hoke, in command of two brigades from North Carolina, and one from Virginia, together with a cavalry regiment and seven batteries of artillery, appeared in the rear of the town on the 17th of April. A vigorous attack resulted in the surrender of the garrison on the following day, though not without so determined a resistance as to cost the assailants dear. after the capture of the entrenchments, and of the town itself, General Wessel continued to hold out in Fort Williams; but, on the magazine exploding, and several of the troops quitting the work, in order that they might make their submission, the gallant commander was unable any further to prolong his resistance, and therefore surrendered on the 19th. During the attack on Plymouth, the proceedings of the Confederate army were greatly assisted by the action of a steam-ram, which, passing the fort at the mouth of the river, attacked two of the enemy's gunboats, sank one, compelled the other to retire, and prevented the despatch of reinforcements to the beleaguered garrison. In the latter part of April, the Federals felt themselves under the necessity of abandoning

Even

the town of Washington, on the Tar River, which, in a spirit of wanton destruction, they committed to the flames. General T. N. Palmer, the chief commander of the district, published an order of the day, dated May 3rd, severely denouncing the conduct of the troops who had been concerned in this act. The ranks, he truly remarked, were being disgraced by men who were "not soldiers, but thieves and scoundrels, dead to all sense of honour and humanity." It was certainly high time that some Federal commander should raise his voice against acts of barbarity which were now becoming frequent in many directions.

The demand for soldiers was again urgent at the North. Bounties amounting to some hundreds of dollars were offered to every re-enlisting volunteer, and to every fresh recruit; but the ranks were not filled up with as much alacrity as was required, and on the 1st of February Mr. Lincoln ordered a draft of 500,000 men in three years. On the 29th of the same month, an Act of Congress for reviving in the army the grade of Lieutenant-General (which, excepting in the case of General Scott, had been discontinued since the death of Washington, for whom it had been created) received the sanction of the President, who immediately sent to the Senate for confirmation the appointment of Major-General Grant to that honour. Grant shortly afterwards left the department of Tennessee for Washington, that he might be formally invested with his higher rank. The ceremony took place on the 9th of March; on the 11th, Grant was back in Tennessee; and on the 12th the President appointed him to the chief command of all the armies of the United States, in place of General Halleck, who was relieved from that position at his own request. At the same time, Halleck was made Chief of the Staff; General Sherman was assigned to the command of the military division of the Mississippi; and General J. B. McPherson was placed in command of the Department and Army of Tennessee. Grant left Nashville on the 19th of March for Washington, and proceeded thence to the Army of the Potomac, where his head-quarters were for a time to be fixed.

Two attempts on Richmond, of a very rash and ill-judged character, were made in the early part of 1864, a little before the appointment of Grant to his higher command. General Sedgwick was directed to conduct a reconnaissance across the Rapidan on the 5th of February, so as to distract the attention of the Confederates while General Wister, of Butler's command, advanced towards the Chickahominy, in the hope of surprising the rebel capital. The enemy, however, was found to be so well prepared that Wister considered it imperative

1864.]

to retire with all speed. Another movement with the same object was commenced on the 27th of the month. It was hoped that the raiders would be able to liberate the Federal prisoners of war, and perhaps to capture Mr. Jefferson Davis and the members of his Government, even if they were afterwards compelled to relinquish the city. General Kilpatrick was the officer selected for leading the principal column; and while he marched direct on Richmond, Colonel Dahlgren and General Custer were to threaten the city from other points, and thus divide the forces of the defenders. time, the enterprise was not known beforehand by the Southerners, and for a while all went well. Custer drew off Stuart and his cavalry towards Charlottesville, and then retreated across the Rapidan to the main army. Kilpatrick pushed on through an almost deserted country, burning bridges and tearing up rails, and on the 1st of March arrived within sight of Richmond. But here his good fortune ended. Dahlgren, who was to have made his demonstration against the city from the south side

This

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of the James River, was evidently not approaching, and Kilpatrick retreated across the Chickahominy, followed by Wade Hampton's cavalry. It afterwards appeared that Colonel Dahlgren (a son of the well-known Admiral) had been unable to cross the James; that on the evening of the 2nd of March he found himself close to Richmond, on the west side; that, being confronted with powerful forces, he endeavoured to rejoin Kilpatrick; but that he had been pursued and killed, with the capture of several of his men. His body was stripped, plundered, and mutilated-a piece of barbarity which the Confederates excused by saying that some orders were found on his person, directing the released prisoners to pillage and burn Richmond, and to kill Mr. Davis and his "traitorous crew;" but it seems probable that these orders were forged by the enemy, as a means of palliating his own misconduct. The expedition was of a romantic rather than a practical character, and it fell to pieces before the stern resistance of facts which had not been correctly estimated.

To

WHEN General Grant succeeded to the chief command of all the armies of the United States, in March, he found himself at the head of a force overwhelming in point of numbers, and provided in the most ample measure with the resources of modern warfare. A few weeks later on the 1st of May-the available military strength of the Federal States was upwards of 770,000. this immense army the Confederates could only oppose much scantier legions. Even so enormous a force, however, would have been useless, had it lacked commanders of sufficient capacity. But the North could now depend on the services of tried and able officers; and in Grant was to be found a directing mind which would assuredly not fail in

energy or intelligence. His leading idea, as related by himself after the termination of the war, was that active and continuous operations by all the troops that could be brought into the field, regardless of season and weather, were necessary to complete and speedy success. The armies of the East and of the West, he was not slow to perceive, acted independently of one another, and without concert; while the enemy, taking advantage of his interior lines of communication for transporting troops from one point to another, was enabled to reinforce any army that might be particularly pressed, and also, during seasons of Federal inactivity, to furlough large numbers of men, who were then at liberty to return to their homes, and

assist for a few months in reproductive labours. General Grant therefore determined to use the greatest number of troops practicable against the armed hosts of the Confederacy, thus preventing his opponents from using the same force at different seasons against first one and then another of the Northern armies, and allowing them no possibility of repose for refitting, or for the production of fresh supplies. He also resolved to strike continuously against the forces of the enemy, until, "by mere

fighting qualities of the soldiers, and the ability of the Generals, than by positive numbers; but alto. gether the assemblage of armed men, when we con sider both sides, was probably greater than any one nation has ever set in hostile array. If to the forces of the North already referred to we add 222,000 for those of the South-and this appears to be a probable estimate we reach a total of nearly a million. And these were for the most part men of the same race and the same tongue, whose

attrition, if in no other way," nothing should be left them but submission.*

To crush out the heart of the rebellion by simultaneous operations on a vast scale, was the scheme favoured by General Grant. He proposed to march against Richmond with the armies of the Potomac and of the James River, while Sherman, in command of the three armies of the Cumberland, Tennessee, and Ohio, was to move towards Atlanta, in the State of Georgia. For the protection of Richmond, General Lee had less than 58,000 men of all arms. In other parts of the Confederacy, the armies of the South were formidable rather by the

* Report to the Secretary of War, July 22nd, 1865.

mutual animosity derived additional heat and rancour from the very affinities of the contending sides. In the Federal armies, however, were many thousand men of foreign origin, recruited from the large bodies of emigrants constantly arriving in America. These, and the much larger population of the Northern as compared with the Southern States, enabled the Government of Mr. Lincoln to put such gigantic armies in the field, and, after repeated losses of the most appalling character, to be ready with fresh legions for yet grander enterprises. prises. Even more remarkable, however, was the

+ Elaborate details are given (apparently on good authority) by Colonel Fletcher in his History of the War.

corps. These were wielded by Hancock, Sedgwick, and Warren, while the principal commander continued to be Meade, under the general directions of Grant, in his new capacity as head of the entire forces of the Union. On the 4th of May, the Army of the Potomac crossed the Rapidan, driving in the Confederate pickets, and advancing through the dense shades of the Wilderness in a southeasterly direction. General Burnside, with the 9th corps, remained for awhile at Warrenton, north of the Rappahannock, to protect the line of communi

sever the communication of the Southerners with Richmond, Lee ordered the larger part of his army to march towards the advancing foe, while with the rest he watched the fords of the Upper Rapidan, that he might guard against a flank attack on his left. In the early morning of the 5th, the vanguard of Ewell's corps came into collision with the Federals on the banks of a small stream called Wilderness Run, near the plank-road which figured in Hooker's battles. After a fiercely-contested action, in which success seemed now to incline to the one side, and

then to the other, the Confederates remained in the more favourable position, although their brilliant courage and lavish expenditure of life had enabled them to do little more than check the Federal advance. The battle lasted the whole day, and was distinguished by the utmost valour and resolution on both sides; but on the approach of night the two armies stood fronting one another on much the same ground as at first, and but little space separated their opposing ranks. Grant had sought to outflank his enemy on the right, so as to get between him and Richmond; but in this he had failed.

With the following morning, the struggle commenced again. The Federal army was drawn up across the Orange and Fredericksburg road;-the right, under Sedgwick, covering Germania Ford; the centre, under Warren, posted at Wilderness Tavern; and the left, under Hancock, drawn up to the south-east of Chancellorsville. The reserve, under Burnside, which had crossed the Rapidan during the previous night, was stationed in the rear, with orders to support Sedgwick, should support be needed by him, or, in the event of the worst happening, to cover the retreat of the army towards its base. The Federal line of battle extended over about five miles, and throughout the whole of its course was involved in tangled woods. Owing to the thickness of the trees, it was impossible to employ cavalry, to execute any complicated manœuvres, or to make much use of artillery. Hard handto-hand fighting was what lay before the two combatants, and in this the day was not deficient. Grant (who, in rear of the centre, was acting in concert with Meade) ordered an advance of his whole line, and for some hours the battle swayed to and fro with changeful fortune. The Federal left attacked with such irresistible fury that the Confederates under Wilcox and Heth were scattered in utter rout, and Lee, for once, almost lost his equanimity as he saw the ruin that had overtaken some of his trusted divisions. Had it not been for the timely appearance of General Longstreet with McLaws's division, the disaster would have been even more extreme. Longstreet had lately returned from the West, and his arrival on the present occasion saved the Confederate right from a crushing reverse. The attacking force was driven back with the loss of many prisoners, and Grant then ordered the greater part of Burnside's corps to strengthen the line between the left and the centre. The movement was scarcely completed when Lee directed a vehement attack on the Federal positions. This was headed by Longstreet, who in a little while fell seriously wounded-struck accidentally, like Jackson at Chancellorsville, by a volley from his own men,

who, seeing some officers through the trees, mistook them for Federals. Another Confederate General (Jenkins) was killed by the same discharge; and the sad calamity introduced a feeling of confusion and dismay into the attacking force. The movement was only partially successful, and that but for a brief while. Ultimately, after a great deal of hot fighting in all parts of the line, during which the Federal right wing was in some degree overlapped, the Confederates were repulsed, and the Union troops in the main retained their ground.

Finding his own right seriously menaced, and that of his adversary not turned, as he had hoped, Grant resolved, on the 7th, to shift his position so far as to make Fredericksburg his base of operations, and to relinquish all hold on Germania Ford, while retaining possession of the other passages over the river. This change of front was safely accomplished, and, on the morning of the 8th, General Lee withdrew from the slightly advanced position he had gained. It then became evident that Grant's object was to seize Spottsylvania Court House, a rather important strategical point, as being situated at the junction of several roads. Longstreet's corps, now commanded by General Anderson, had been sent thither on the previous night, and was already in possession of the place when, on the following day, a large body of Federal infantry arrived. Lee sent up additional troops on discovering what his antagonist was endeavouring to effect, and the fighting on the 8th resulted in the Confederates retaining their position. Very little occurred on the 9th; but, in the course of some rather unimportant fighting, a Confederate rifle-bullet brought death to the brave, experienced, and veteran Federal commander, General Sedgwick. Towards night, Grant ordered another advance against the enemy. The right wing crossed over to the south bank of the Upper Po; but, after an encounter with the opposing troops, the Federals withdrew to the northern side of the river.

The forces under General Grant occupied, on the morning of the 10th, pretty nearly the same position as that which they had held the day before. The line stretched about six miles on the north bank of the Po, with the wings thrown forward, and the centre withdrawn somewhat to the rear. Severe fighting again took place, and the Federal losses throughout the day were estimated to exceed 10,000. This was perhaps in excess of the fact; but it is certain that the slaughter was great, without any commensurate gain. The Confederates were driven to their breastworks, but were not compelled to abandon their chief positions. Nevertheless, they had lost a large number in dead, wounded,