As Federals and Confederates continued operating from their trenches outside Petersburg and Richmond in Virginia, Federal General-in-Chief Ulysses S. Grant continued seeking ways to break the Confederate line. But due to the Federal disaster at the Crater in late July, he wanted to avoid a direct assault. He had sent a detachment north of the James River to probe the defenses outside Richmond, and now he was looking to starve the Confederates into submission by cutting their lines of supply south of Petersburg.
Grant knew that General Robert E. Lee, commanding the Confederate Army of Northern Virginia, had sent part of his force to the Shenandoah Valley. Grant also knew that Lee had reinforced the Confederate defenses in front of Richmond, north of the James. Based on this, Grant guessed that Lee’s defense line outside Petersburg was weak and vulnerable to attack.
Grant therefore directed Major-General Gouverneur Warren, commanding the Fifth Corps (Army of the Potomac), to cut the Weldon Railroad. This was a key Confederate supply line running from Petersburg to the port of Wilmington on the Atlantic coast. Warren was to extend the Federal siege line to Globe Tavern, south of the weakened Petersburg defenses. This would be the first major Federal attempt since the Battle of the Crater to disrupt the Confederate siege lines at Petersburg.
As Warren prepared, Major-General George G. Meade, commanding the Army of the Potomac, received word that Lee currently had just three divisions in the Petersburg works. He therefore ordered Warren to mobilize his corps at 3 a.m. on August 16 and cut the Weldon Railroad at the Vaughan Road crossing, about two miles southeast of Petersburg. If the opportunity presented itself, Warren was to capture the enemy works. But Grant suspended this order when he received conflicting information about the strength of the Confederate defenses.
On the 16th, Grant modified Meade’s order by directing Warren to proceed with cutting the Weldon Railroad, but it was be just a reconnaissance in force, and Warren was not “to fight any unequal battles nor to assault fortifications.” This was designed “to take advantage of any weakness of the enemy he may discover.” If Warren could not cut the railroad at Vaughan, he was to “strike or feel farther south… I want, if possible, to make such demonstrations as will force Lee to withdraw a portion of his troops from the (Shenandoah) valley, so that (General Philip) Sheridan can strike a blow against the balance.”
Meade added to Grant’s orders by directing Warren to move out at 4 a.m. on the 18th and “endeavor to make a lodgment upon the Weldon Railroad, in the vicinity of the Gurley house, or as much nearer to the enemy’s line of entrenchments as practicable.”
When President Abraham Lincoln learned of Grant’s plan, he sent Grant an encouraging message: “I have seen your despatch expressing your unwillingness to break your hold where you are. Neither am I willing. Hold on with a bulldog grip, and chew and choke as much as possible.” Grant laughed upon reading this dispatch and told his staff, “The president has more nerve than any of his advisers.”
Warren’s Federals set out as ordered on the 18th, marching through rain and mud before arriving at Globe Tavern five hours later. They were about four miles south of Petersburg, and three miles south of the Confederate defenses. A division began wrecking the railroad while Brigadier-General Romeyn B. Ayres’s division turned north to face any Confederate attempt to stop the operation. Ayres’s men struggled to maneuver in the dense woods and oppressive heat. Brigadier-General Samuel W. Crawford’s division came up to support Ayres’s right.
General P.G.T. Beauregard, commanding the Petersburg defenses while Lee was north of the James, called upon Lieutenant-General A.P. Hill’s Third Corps to confront the Federals. Hill dispatched two brigades under Major-General Henry Heth and another brigade under Major-General Robert F. Hoke. Fighting began in heavy rain.
The Confederates initially drove Ayres and Crawford back toward Globe Tavern, but the Federals were reinforced by Brigadier-General Lysander Cutler’s division on Ayres’s left. They regrouped and advanced, and by nightfall they regained their original positions. Warren notified Crawford, “You have done very well indeed in getting forward through that difficult country. Make yourself as strong as you can and hold on. I will try and re-enforce you…”
General Meade dispatched reinforcements from the Ninth and Second corps and ordered Warren to hold the railroad “at all hazards.” The Federals lost 836 men (544 killed or wounded, and 292 missing) in the action on the 18th. Fighting would continue the next day.
Bibliography
- Bearss, Edwin C. with Suderow, Bryce, The Petersburg Campaign: The Eastern Front Battles, June-August 1864, Volume I. El Dorado Hills, Calif.: Savas Beattie LLC; Casemate Publishers, Kindle Edition, 2012.
- Catton, Bruce, Grant Takes Command. Open Road Media, Kindle Edition, 2015.
- Davis, Jefferson, The Rise and Fall of the Confederate Government: All Volumes. Heraklion Press, Kindle Edition 2013, 1889.
- Davis, William C., Death in the Trenches: Grant at Petersburg. Alexandria, VA: Time-Life Books, 1983.
- Foote, Shelby, The Civil War, A Narrative: Red River to Appomattox. New York: Vintage Civil War Library, Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group (Kindle Edition), 2011.
- Freeman, Douglas Southall, Lee. Scribner, (Kindle Edition), 2008.
- Long, E.B. with Long, Barbara, The Civil War Day by Day. New York: Da Capo Press, Inc., 1971.
- Sears, Stephen W., Lincoln’s Lieutenants: The High Command of the Army of the Potomac. Boston, New York: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Books, (Kindle Edition), 2017.
- Wert, Jeffry D. (Patricia L. Faust ed.), Historical Times Illustrated Encyclopedia of the Civil War. New York: Harper & Row, 1986.
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