Your Brother in Arms: A Union Soldier's Odyssey

Chapter Eleven: The Wilderness, Spotsylvania Court House, and North Anna River—The Overland Campaign and Hospital Recovery, April–July 1864

179 Chapter Eleven The Wilderness, Spotsylvania Court House, and North Anna River The Overland Campaign and Hospital Recovery, April—July 1864 The Army of the Potomac “General Grant, about how long will it take you to get to Richmond?” “I will agree to be there in about four days—that is, if General Lee becomes a party to the agreement, but if he objects, the trip will undoubtedly be prolonged .” —Exchange between a newspaper correspondent and General Ulysses S. Grant, Campaigning with Grant Ulysses Grant chose to establish his headquarters at Culpeper,Virginia,for a variety of strategic and practical reasons. Culpeper’s proximity to Washington made a quick trip by train to the Federal capital convenient. Grant also could increase his understanding of the Army of the Potomac while he kept an eye on its commander, George Meade. Grant concluded that his knowledge of the western theater—based on his recent experience there and the high level of confidence he had in his western commander, William T. Sherman—made remote command of that army feasible. And, on a more personal note, Grant was eager to take on the mythical Robert E. Lee and the 180 Your Brother in Arms Army of Northern Virginia. While Grant respected Lee as an innovative and tenacious commander, he thought that the Army of the Potomac leadership put too much stock in Lee’s reputation and needed to be more aggressive in their conduct of the war. Grant knew he had overwhelming superiority in numbers of troops and—thanks to the genius of his chief quartermaster, General Rufus Ingalls—the Army of the Potomac had a supply system second to none. The end of March brought snow, hail, and rain that turned roads into quagmires and made troop movement inadvisable. Not wanting a repeat of Burnside’s 1863 Mud March debacle, Grant kept the Army of the Potomac in winter camp through the end of April. Early April saw a snowstorm at the start of the month that changed to rain as temperatures climbed slowly into the fifties by midday. Roads throughout April remained a problem for troop movements. Once the intermittent rain and hail were over on May 2, the days warmed under bright spring sunshine and roads began drying out. At last the time had come to begin the spring offensive. Grant’s spring campaign strategy was a three-directional choreography of Federal units focusing on Lee: Meade’s Army of the Potomac—supplemented by Burnside’s Ninth Corps—would cross the Rapidan east of the Army of Northern Virginia, flank the Rebels, then turn west and confront them head on. Butler’s Army of the James would head toward Richmond, proceeding up the James River, and separate Lee from the Confederate capital. And Sigel would move his army south through the Shenandoah Valley (“up the Valley”), cut Lee off from his supplies, and imperil his left flank. To keep movements of the army under wraps as long as possible, the infantry of the Army of the Potomac was not told of its routes of march until just before midnight on May 3. By first light the next day, the Army of the Potomac was on the move, with the Fifth Corps, under Warren, heading down the Germanna Plank Road to cross the Rapidan at Germanna Ford followed by Sedgwick’s Sixth Corps and with Hancock’s Second Corps crossing at nearby Ely’s Ford to avoid the congestion of three army corps crossing the river at the same point at the same time. Burnside’s Ninth Corps crossed at Germanna Ford later in the day. The plan called for the Army of the Potomac to pass through the Wilderness—a sixty-square-mile area of tangled thickets, pine, scrub oak, and cedars. Andrew Humphreys, Meade’s chief of staff, wanted the Federal troops to move quickly through the Wilderness so that they would not be trapped in this inhospitable maze where they could not easily maneuver, fire with accuracy , or use artillery. Meade’s numerical advantage, in Humphreys’s view, would be lost in this impenetrable thicket. Meade rejected his chief of staff’s recommendation and halted the army in the Wilderness so that the wagon Overland Campaign and Hospital Recovery, April—July 1864 181 trains could catch up with the troops. (The supply train of 4,300 wagons with food, forage, ammunition, 835 ambulances, and a herd of...