General-in-Chief Ulysses S. Grant had his massive Federal armies in motion early on March 28. Grant looked to move past the right (southwest) flank of General-in-Chief Robert E. Lee’s Confederate Army of Northern Virginia to prevent Lee from escaping from his trenches at Petersburg and Richmond. Grant had tried this maneuver numerous times since the siege of Petersburg began last June with little success, but he was confident that Lee’s army was now weak enough to break if stretched far enough.
The Federal movement was led by Major-General Philip Sheridan’s cavalry command. The 12,000 troopers began heading south from the James River as Grant attended the City Point conference with President Abraham Lincoln. Grant had instructed Sheridan:
“Move your cavalry at as early an hour as you can, and without being confined to any particular road or roads. You may go out by the nearest roads in rear of the Fifth Corps, pass by its left, and passing near to or through Dinwiddie, reach the right and rear of the enemy as soon as you can. It is not the intention to attack the enemy in his intrenched position, but to force him out if possible. Should he come out and attack us, or get himself where he can be attacked, move in with your entire force in your own way, and with the full reliance that the army will engage or follow the enemy, as circumstances will dictate.”
The cavalry troopers were followed by 18,500 troops from Major-General E.O.C. Ord’s Army of the James, which were embarking on a 36-mile march from the line in front of Richmond to the southwestern sector of the Petersburg line. Ord’s moving column consisted of two divisions from the Twenty-fourth Corps and one division from the Twenty-fifth Corps.
Ord left three divisions to hold the Richmond line under Major-General Godfrey Weitzel. The movement was so quiet that Lieutenant-General James Longstreet, commanding the Confederates opposite Ord, was not aware that the bulk of Ord’s Federals had left. Weitzel kept up the ruse by directing regimental bands to play as usual and building fires in the camps that had been abandoned. Ord was so sure that this offensive would succeed that he left Weitzel instructions on how to proceed once the enemy evacuated Richmond.
Ord’s moving force was to replace the Second and Fifth corps from Major-General George G. Meade’s Army of the Potomac on the siege line while those units supported Sheridan’s movement. The remaining corps of the Potomac army–the Sixth and Ninth–were to hold their trenches east of Petersburg. They would act as a kind of reserve that would seize the first opportunity to break through the enemy line and capture Petersburg. In a way, Grant was giving top command of this offensive to Sheridan and Ord, ahead of Meade.
Meanwhile, General Lee’s Confederates were arranged as follows:
- Longstreet’s corps held the extreme north of the line in front of Richmond
- Major-General William Mahone’s division held the line to Longstreet’s right (south), between the James and Appomattox rivers
- Major-General John B. Gordon’s corps held a four-mile line in front of Petersburg to Mahone’s right
- Lieutenant-General A.P. Hill’s corps held an eight-mile line to the south and west of Petersburg to Gordon’s right
- Lieutenant-General Richard H. Anderson’s corps held the extreme Confederate right flank, southwest of Petersburg
- Major-General George Pickett commanded the reserve
Lee looked to Pickett to meet the threat posed by Sheridan on the extreme right. Longstreet and Mahone were a day’s march from that point and could not be counted on to make it there in case of battle.
During the day, Grant met with Major-General William T. Sherman, commanding the Federal armies in North Carolina. Sherman informed Grant that if needed, his armies could join Grant’s Federals by April 10. If Lee escaped the siege, Sherman could intercept him near Danville or Lynchburg. If Lee could not escape, Sherman could join Grant and take the Confederate trenches by overwhelming assault.
By day’s end, the Federals were positioned as follows:
- Weitzel’s troops held the line at Richmond and Bermuda Hundred
- Major-General John G. Parke’s Ninth Corps held the line from the Appomattox on Weitzel’s left (south)
- Major-General Horatio G. Wright’s Sixth Corps held the line on Parke’s left
- Ord’s moving column was replacing the Second and Fifth corps under Major-Generals Andrew A. Humphreys and -Gouverneur Warren to the left of Wright, which stretched to Hatcher’s Run
- Humphreys and Warren were moving to support Sheridan as his troopers moved west of Hatcher’s Run
The Federals were once again poised to cut the Confederates’ last supply lines into Petersburg and Richmond and starve them into submission. But Lee was determined not to let that happen.
Bibliography
- Bearss, Edwin C. with Suderow, Bryce, The Petersburg Campaign: The Western Front Battles, September 1864-April 1865, Volume II. El Dorado Hills, Calif.: Savas Beattie LLC; Casemate Publishers, Kindle Edition, 2012.
- Catton, Bruce, The Army of the Potomac: A Stillness at Appomattox. Garden City, NY: Doubleday & Co., Inc., 1953.
- Catton, Bruce, Grant Takes Command. Open Road Media, Kindle Edition, 2015.
- 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.