As Federal forces entered Petersburg, the fall of the Confederate capital was imminent. It was a warm and pleasant day in Richmond; a woman wrote that it was “one of those unusually lovely days that the spring sometimes brings, when delicate silks that look too fine at other times seem just to suit.” The city’s elite gathered for Communion Sunday services at St. Paul’s Episcopal Church. Among them was President Jefferson Davis, seated in pew 63.
The rector, Dr. Charles Minnigerode, delivered his invocation, which partly read, “The Lord is in his holy temple; let all the earth keep silence before him.” The sexton delivered a telegram to the president amid the silence. As Davis opened the envelope and read, witnesses noted “a sort of gray pallor creep over his face.” It was from General-in-Chief Robert E. Lee, who advised him that Richmond must be evacuated by end of day. Constance Gary, who was sitting behind the president, recalled, “With stern set lips and his usual quick military tread, he left the church. A number of other people rose in their seats and hastened after him. Those who were left were swept by a universal terror of alarm.”
As he left, Davis told nobody about the situation so as to prevent a panic. But as more messages came to other government officials and their families, word quickly spread that the capital was about to fall. At the nearby Second Presbyterian Church, Reverend Moses Hoge received the news during his sermon and announced to his congregation, “Brethren, trying times are before us… but remember that God is with us in the storm as well as in the calm. We may never meet again. Go quietly to our homes, and whatever may be in store for us, let us not forget that we are Christian men and women, and may the protection of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost be with you all.”
While government clerks began stacking documents in the streets and burning them, Davis met with Secretary of War John C. Breckinridge to make plans to evacuate the city. The rest of his cabinet was summoned for an emergency meeting. Davis then wrote to Lee to confirm that the evacuation had to be immediate: “To move to night will involve the loss of many valuables, both for the want of time to pack and of transportation. Arrangements are progressing, and unless you otherwise advise the start will be made.”
Lee was busy evacuating Petersburg when he received Davis’s message. He read it, tore it up and snapped, “I am sure I gave him sufficient notice!” He then calmly replied, “Your telegram received. I think it will be necessary to move tonight. I shall camp the troops here north of the Appomattox. The enemy is so strong that they will cross above us & close us in between the James & Appomattox Rivers, if we remain.”
Davis met with his cabinet that night and informed them that Richmond was lost. Each cabinet member was to bring his department’s archives to the depot of the last railroad still operating out of the capital, the Richmond & Danville in the southwest part of town. These officials and their families were to be taken to “a convenient point of safety.” Davis was determined to keep the government functioning no matter what.
Richmond’s imminent fall was announced to the public late that afternoon. Many were shocked by the news because they did not know that the city was in such danger; the Richmond press had been discouraged from reporting Federal success to avoid demoralizing the public. Residents wept as they either hurried to leave or resolved to stay and leave their fate to the Yankees.
Pandemonium reigned as every road was quickly jammed with humanity. Government officials scrambled to get family members aboard packet boats on the James River Canal before fleeing to safety. Davis booked two trains on the Danville line. One was a special government train with boxcars hastily labeled “War Department,” “Quarter-Masters Department,” etc. The other was the Treasury train, which contained all the gold and silver pieces, ingots, bricks, dollars, and coins totaling some $528,000. These assets were guarded by 60 midshipmen from the Patrick Henry, the Confederacy’s naval academy training vessel, under the command of Captain William H. Parker.
The special train was ready to leave at 8 p.m. Davis collected effects from the Executive Mansion and organized what was left so the Federals would not think he rushed out too hastily. Davis also sent an armchair to Mrs. Robert E. Lee in hopes of easing her arthritis; she was too infirmed to leave Richmond. The president rode through the panicked crowds to get to the depot (his wife and children had already left town in late March). By 11 p.m., Davis and most other top officials had boarded the train. Only Lee’s orderly retreat from Petersburg enabled the train to escape before the Federals arrived. The 140-mile trip to Danville took 20 hours.
Back in Richmond, the chaos continued. Inmates walked out of the abandoned state prison, and the inevitable looting and pillaging began. The Local Defense Board fell apart as marauders plundered shops, stores, and homes. Richmond officials issued orders to destroy all whiskey to prevent a drunken riot, but the people gathered all the liquor they could find and even scooped it up after it was dumped in the streets. A resident wrote that this was “the saddest of many of the sad sights of the war–a city undergoing pillage at the hands of its own mob, while the standards of an empire were being taken from its capitol.” Another wrote that on this night, “the devil was loosed.”
Navy Secretary Stephen R. Mallory directed Rear-Admiral Raphael Semmes to destroy the Patrick Henry and all other vessels on the James River before they fell into Federal hands. The exploding ships shattered windows in Richmond. Semmes later wrote, “The spectacle was grand beyond description.” All remaining sailors were formed into an infantry brigade and sent with the rest of the Confederate troops out of town.
On land, Lieutenant-General Richard Ewell ordered the destruction of all military equipment and supplies that could not be evacuated. Confederates burned warehouses that night, and the fires quickly spread out of control. They burned most tobacco barns, flour mills, and public buildings, as well as the offices of the Richmond Examiner and Inquirer.
The fires destroyed much of the main part of Richmond, with the massive inferno engulfing homes, hotels, factories, and warehouses. Around 2 a.m., the fires reached the national arsenal holding gunpowder and nearly a million artillery shells. This set off massive explosions that rocked the city for hours. Streets quickly filled with “those silent awful fires,” and resident Mary Fontaine wrote, “All like myself were watching them, paralyzed and breathless.”
By dawn on the 3rd, the city that had defiantly served as the Confederate capital for nearly four years lay in ruins.
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