June 2, 1864---The Battle of Cold Harbor (Day Three)

JUNE 2, 1864:   

The Battle of Cold Harbor      (Day Three):          

After a forced night march, the Union Second, Sixth and Eighteenth Corps arrive at Old Cold Harbor after dawn. The men are so physically exhausted that Grant can make no use of them. He gives his men most of the day off, scheduling the opening of his planned assault until 5:00 P.M.  As the day passes, more footsore Union troops straggle into Old Cold Harbor. He delays the attack again, until 4:30 AM on the 3^rd.

While Union troops arrive and bivouac, Lee puts his arriving men to work digging entrenchments and building earthworks. 

If he had launched an initial attack, Grant may have just been able to overcome the works as they stood on June 1^st. By June 3^rd, the Confederacy has built itself a fortress.

 

Union General Don Carlos Buell, who has been without a Command since the Battle of Perryville in 1862, resigns in disgrace from the Union Army.

June 1, 1864---The Battle of Cold Harbor (Day Two)

JUNE 1, 1864:             

The Battle of Cold Harbor   (Day Two):            

The Confederacy appears to be in deep trouble. For the last month, The Army of Northern Virginia has been forced to give ground steadily as Ulysses S. Grant and The Army of The Potomac have pressed southward in the face of determined resistance. Battle after battle has been fought. Soldiers in blue seem to appear from a well-nigh inexhaustible source. The Confederacy has no such source. In just a single month of intensely concentrated combat, Grant has managed to advance from the Rapidan River to the outskirts of Richmond, a distance of 60 critical miles.

Although most historians hold that most of the many individual battles of Grant’s Overland Campaign were tactically inconclusive, Grant has displayed strategic genius. By simply pressing forward regardless of the intransigence of the enemy, he has forced Robert E. Lee to, time and again, take up blocking positions in an attempt to keep Grant from the gates of Richmond.

As of the morning of June 1, 1864, Lee’s blocking maneuvers have been a failure. Although he has been able to inflict fearsome casualties on the Union Army, this has not deterred Grant from moving forward. As the sun rises, Union troops are in control of the town of Old Cold Harbor, just ten miles from Jefferson Davis’ desk.

Lee’s only advantage is speed, and today he uses it. The Union Army is scattered hither, thither, and yon over a forty mile front twenty five miles deep stretching from the North Anna River to the Chickahominy River. Lee knows it will take time --- a precious day at least --- for the Federals to organize and move in force.

Lee’s smaller army can maneuver faster, and today he puts out the call. His men abandon their positions and race toward greater Richmond.  In the meantime, Lee sends what infantry and cavalry units he already has toward Old Cold Harbor. Lee knows that Union troops are there, and he is determined to retake the crossroads.

Lee orders an attack shortly after dawn, hoping to overwhelm the small Union force at Old Cold Harbor before more Northern troops can arrive. This plan goes awry when the Commander of the assault force, Colonel Lawrence Keitt of South Carolina is killed early in the battle. Keitt’s green 20th South Carolina regiment panics. The inexperienced men in the vanguard beat a frantic retreat. The panic spreads, and the Confederates run off, allowing Sheridan's troops to hold the crossroads. The Union sustains 2,200 casualties, the Confederacy 1,800.

Lee eventually masters his men, and they dig in, just as they have been doing throughout the Campaign. Grant decides that he does not have enough men on hand to overcome an entrenched enemy, and so he decides to wait for the bulk of The Army of The Potomac to arrive before renewing the attack. The delay proves costly. Lee’s forces arrive first.

May 31, 1864---The Battle of Cold Harbor (Day One)

MAY 31, 1864:             

The Battle of Cold Harbor  (Day One):  

 

Union troops enter the town of Old Cold Harbor and occupy it. For the first time since the Peninsula Campaign of the Spring and Summer of 1862, the Union can hear the church bells of Richmond. Richmond’s outskirts lie six miles south. The city center lies only ten miles away. The war may, if all goes well for the Union, end in early June. 

May 30, 1864---The Battle of Crump's Creek; The Battle of Shady Grove Road; The Battle of Old Church; The Battle of Bethesda Church

MAY 30, 1864:            

The Battle of Crump’s Creek:           

As Union units try to swing around the Confederate flank, they become bogged down in the wetlands of Crump’s Creek. A vicious firefight breaks out between the mired Union troops and Confederate sharpshooters who inflict heavy casualties on the stuck men. 

The Battle of Shady Grove Road:      

Union troops moving toward the town of Hanover Court House engage in battle with Confederate pickets sent to delay and harass them. After a violent exchange, the pickets are killed or driven off, but they have successfully delayed the Union advance for the day. 

The Battle of Old Church (The Battle of Matadequin Creek):         

 By this point in the greater battle of Topopotomoy Creek, Union units are fighting everywhere between the North Anna River and the Chickahominy River, facing off with determined Confederate resistance. The Old Church is just 1.5 miles away from, and thus within easy reach of the crossroads of Old Cold Harbor, a town which is just six miles from Richmond. Robert E. Lee knows that if the Union can take Old Cold Harbor it can essentially walk into Richmond in a day, and so he orders crack troops to hold the line at Matadequin Creek. Although the Rebels fight the Union infantry to a standstill, Union cavalry under General George Armstrong Custer overrun the Confederate positions along the creek, opening the road to Old Cold Harbor.    

 

The Battle of Bethesda Church:        

Not far from the Old Church, Union troops force their way south of Matadequin Creek toward Beulah Church. By the end of the day, Old Cold Harbor is in the grip of two Union pincers just waiting to close. 

May 29, 1864: The Battle of Hanovertown

MAY 29, 1864:           

The Battle of Hanovertown:              

Violent combat continues in the vicinity of Topopotomoy Creek. Fighting rages around the Shelton farmstead named “Rural Plains” in Hanovertown, once the home of American Patriot Patrick Henry. Although both sides try to spare the house, it bears scars of the battle to this day.