March 2, 1865---The Battle of Waynesboro'

MARCH 2, 1865:       

The Battle of Waynesboro, Virginia.

After having been repulsed the day before by Jubal Early’s scarecrow force of 1,500 men in the fastness of the Luray Valley, Philip Sheridan returns today with 3,000 men and George Armstrong Custer under his command. Although Sheridan has been tasked to join Sherman in North Carolina, he considers Early’s force a threat to Grant’s rear and decides to clear out the Luray Valley once and for all.  Today, Early brings up his artillery, and there is a brief standoff, but Early’s thirteen remaining guns are no match for Sheridan’s multiple artillery brigades. Nor can Early resist attack from all sides. He has anchored his line in a dense woods, thinking that the Federals cannot move on him from that direction. When the Yankees come howling through the small forest, Early’s line finally cracks. Surrounded on all sides, almost all of his 1,500 men throw down their weapons and surrender.

Early himself, with just a few men, perhaps 50 in all, rides east to join Robert E. Lee at Richmond. When the patchworn General presents himself to Lee, Lee takes one look at him and his remaining force, and relieves him from command, telling him to “go home.”

Early and a few like-minded men ride for Texas where they hear Confederate holdouts are massing. This rumor turns out to be false, and for a time Early goes to Mexico and then to Canada in defiance of the Union, before returning to Virginia. His part in the Civil War is over.

  

Robert E. Lee, in the shadow of this defeat, sends a message to Grant asking for a “military convention” between them in order to end “the calamities of war.” Lee asks for a cease-fire and negotiations again between the “two Sovereign Powers”. Grant, under orders from Lincoln, responds that he can only discuss surrender terms that end in reunification.