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coming storm; and Gen. Lee was now evidently determined to stand at bay and fight to the last.

The designs of the Federal commander were soon evident. For some time he had rested on the assurance that, with the force at his command, and the advantages of his new base at City Point, success was but a question of time. He knew quite accurately the strength and condition of the opposing force, and that it was quite impossible for Gen. Lee to hold with it a line extending forty miles, and on both sides of the James River. The junction of Sheridan's cavalry raised Grant's force to 170,000 effectives, and was the signal of action. On the 29th March commenced the movement to the left, and the attack upon the Confederate right. This movement was made under the cover of a threatened attack along the entire line, but did not deceive the wakeful eye of Lee, who at once prepared to resist as best he could. The divisions of Gen. Pickett and of Gen. Bushrod Johnson were sent to the extreme right, and with them the cavalry, in numbers small; and in the weak and broken-down condition of their horses, almost starved for want of food, in poor plight to compete with the splendid army under Sheridan, flushed with their recent successes. Το Sheridan and his ten thousand cavalry, supported by two corps of picked infantry, was intrusted the movement upon Lee's right flank. The first attack was unsuccessful; at Dinwiddie CourtHouse Sheridan was defeated by the troops under Pickett, and compelled to retreat. He renewed the attack upon the 1st April, his cavalry covering and completely masking his infantry. The battle of "Five Forks" followed. It was the last important fight of the war. The forces under Johnson and Pickett, two small divisions, with the handful of cavalry, in numbers scarcely onefourth of the opposing host, for a time maintained most gallantly, and with heroic spirit, the unequal contest. Their flanks were turned; they were overpowered by numbers, surrounded, and cut off; resistance was no longer possible, and reinforcements were out of the question.

There never was published any official report, on the Confederate side, of the battle of Five Forks. To this day the reports of the Confederate Generals engaged, although regularly made to Gen. Lee, have never seen the public light; and the consequence has been that the Northern version of the battle has been generally

accepted, even in the newspapers and popular narratives of the South, and a very false idea has obtained of the merits of the action on the side of the Confederates, and particularly as to the extent of the odds against which they contended on the eventful first day of April. The author has before him manuscript copies of the official reports made to Gen. Lee; and from these it appears that the Confederate force was not half what it has been popularly supposed to be; that it maintained the action with courage and ability; that it won a victory at first over Sheridan, before his infantry had reinforced him; and that it at last yielded the field only after it had been nearly enveloped by the largely superiour forces of the enemy. In his official report of Five Forks (suppressed after the surrender of the Confederate arms) Gen. Pickett writes: "The field was most stubbornly contested against great odds. The whole of Sheridan's cavalry, joined with Kautz, the Second corps, and part of the Sixth, were attacking us. I learned a few days. afterwards, from a General of division in Warren's corps, that it was 19,000 strong, making the enemy's force probably 35,000, whilst we did not have more than 8,000 men engaged.' Of this small Confederate force nearly one-half were taken prisoners; and an action which had taken place in the most desperate circumstances, and had once obtained some of the auspices and fruits of a Confederate victory, became a frightful disaster.

But without reference to the battle of Five Forks, and even if a Confederate victory had been obtained there, the fate of Petersburg and Richmond was decided elsewhere; for Grant, espying the weakness of Lee's intrenched line before the former city, determined to break it, and in the morning of the 2d April opened an attack from the Appomattox to Hatcher's Run. Gen. Lee had foreseen such an attack; he knew well how little the troops of Hill and Gordon, strung on the long line, were able to meet it; but he was never more calm and collected than when on this memorable Sabbath, in the broad stretches of the morning sunshine, and on the irradiated landscape, he witnessed from a position near his headquarters the battle that probably contained the fate of himself and army. It was observed that, though always attentive to person, he was dressed this morning with unusual and scrupulous care. His gold-hilted sword, seldom worn, hung by his side. It was as if he had put on his best attire and insignia, not know

his

ing where the night might find him. But to all appearance he was never more self-possessed than when mounted on his iron-gray horse, straight as an arrow and calm as a May morning, he watched through his glasses the advance of the enemy. One could imagine him at a review; the repose of his manner was perfect and commanding, while his restive horse curveted and fretted under him; but it was remarked once that his cheek flushed, and a gleam of battle shone in his face, as a shell burst almost upon him, killing a horse near by, and cutting the bridle-reins of his own magnificent charger.

On came the enemy in double column with fearful array. Check ed momentarily on Gordon's lines to the left of "the Crater," a more determined attack was made on Hill's weaker position; and it was soon observed that the masses of Federal' infantry, overrunning the slender opposition, were pressing to the line of redoubts some two or three hundred yards in rear of the ground first held by Hill. Fort Gregg was run over; Fort Alexander fell only after a heroic resistance; and by noon it was apparent to Gen. Lee, that with the Southside Railroad in the enemy's possession and his intrenched line in front of Petersburg gone, it only remained for him to hold the town long enough to collect and organize his men for the last chances of retreat.

On the brief and fiery drama that had taken place before his eyes he made no comment, further than to turn to Col. Marshall, one of his aides, and say: "Well, Colonel, it has happened as I told them it would in Richmond: the line has been stretched until it has broke."

CHAPTER XIII.

The last retreat of Gen. Lee's army.-Two notable pictures.-Gen. Lee conceives a new prospect of action.-A fatal miscarriage at Amelia Court-House.-No food for the army.-Terrible sufferings of the retreat.-General despair and misery.-Action at Sailor's Creek.-Condition of the army at Appomattox Court-House.-Apparition of the white flag.-Correspondence between Generals Lee and Grant.-Authentic and detailed account of their interview at McLean's House.-Contradiction of various popular reports of this event.-Gen. Lee announcing the terms of surrender to his officers.-Scenes in the encampments.-Gen. Lee's last address to his troops. -His return to Richmond.-Last tokens of affection and respect for the Confederacy.

NIGHT gave Gen. Lee the time he wanted to collect his forces for retreat, and the morning of the 3d April found him across the Appomattox, with the remains of his army well got together, heading away from Richmond. In the light of that morning were two notable pictures. A pall of smoke, with the golden light weaved in its folds, hung in the sky above Richmond; beneath roared and surged a sea of fire, reaching from the island-dotted river to the tall trees that fringed the hill on which the Capitol stood; skirting this sea, pouring down Church Hill, was the victorious army glistening with steel and banners, now ascending Franklin street, curving at the Exchange Hotel to the upper streets that led to Capitol Square, making this curve the point where passionate music clashed out its triumph, and each body of troops took up the cheer of victory, and cavalrymen waved their swords, and the column swept up the hill as if in sudden haste to seize the green patch of ground where stood the dumb walls of the Capitol of the Confederacy. Away from this scene of sublime horrour was the other picture: an army tattered, brown, weather-beaten, moving through the woods and on blind roads, with straggling, distressed trains, the faces of its soldiers turned from Richmond, but ever and anon looking curiously to the sky, and to its pillars and drapery of smoke, and the black horrour that stood there all day, while the forest pulsed in glorious sunshine, and quiet fields peeped out in the garniture of Spring.

The last game of war had now truly commenced between Lee and Grant, the former aiming to save his army, which he had already extricated beyond his hopes, and the latter making every endeavour to cut off and capture or destroy it. In the morning of the 3d April, Gen. Lee showed remarkable spirits, and had evidently obtained a new confidence. A correspondent of the London Times, who faithfully and vividly described the retreat, relates that on this morning Gen. Lee remarked: "I have got my army safe out of its breastworks, and in order to follow me, my enemy must abandon his lines, and can derive no further benefit from his railroads and the James River." Anyhow, a reflection of this sort was just. Gen. Lee had yet an army of twenty-five thousand men; it was foot-loose, ready to move in any direction; the men were exhilarated, relieved from the confinement of siege and emerging into the open country; and having already accomplished so much, the commander might yet hope to use his army with effect, especially if opportunity occurred to fall in detail upon the forces into which Grant would necessarily have to divide his army, with a view to a comprehensive and vigorous pursuit.

In that pursuit, the possession of the Southside Railroad had given the enemy all the advantages of the interiour line. Lee was alive to this disadvantage; the very privates of his army understood it. Men who carried muskets were heard to say to their comrades: "Grant is trying to cut off 'Uncle Robert' at Burkesville junction" (the point of meeting of the Southside and Danville roads); and the answer was: "Grant has got the inside track and can get there first." This was the plain truth of the situation.

Grant held the Southside road, and was pressing forward troops under Sheridan towards the Danville road, to which he had a straight cut without a particle of obstruction, except a small force of cavalry under Fitzhugh Lee. Gen. Lee, on the contrary, was moving by a circuitous route on the north bank of the Appomattox, encumbered by a huge wagon train, and having in front of him a swollen river, which proved, indeed, a terrible delay when every moment counted. So great were these obstacles, that there is little doubt Grant might have effectually intercepted the retreat at Amelia Court-House, if he had made extraordinary exertions to do so, and concentrated the forces under Sheridan and Meade. As it was, Gen. Lee did not succceed in reaching this point until the

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