CHAPTER XIII
Grant’s Spring Opening – By the Left Flank Again – Sheridan at Five Forks – The Fall of Richmond and Petersburg – A Dangerous Ride – How Jeff Davis faced the Yankees – Chasing Lee up the Appomattox – Breaking the Backbone of the Southern Confederacy – The Surrender – Confiscating a Confederate Goose – A Colored Boy to the Rescue.
AND now came the orders for what Grant intended should be the last grand campaign of the gallant Army of the Potomac. Sheridan, as usual, was to lead off and push out around the right flank of the rebel forces cooped up in Petersburg and Richmond. The bulk of the army was to follow, and it was evident that unless the Southern Confederacy got out of the way “right smart,” somebody would get hurt. Everybody was on the move, or ready to move, even the troops who were to remain in the fortifications having their knapsacks packed.
The feeling was general among the rank and file that a decisive battle was to be fought, and all felt that the Union cause would triumph. There were no spread-eagle proclamations promulgated through general orders. Grant was never given to that. His instructions to his lieutenants gave them to understand just what they were expected to do – they were to move against the rebels and go in to win.
Little Phil opened the ball at Five Forks on the last day of March. The army had moved March 29, but the infantry had been unable to make much progress, being stuck in the mud, for the rain set in during the evening of the twenty-ninth and continued all night and the next day and night. The rebels pressed Sheridan hard. Yet the hero of Winchester held on like grim death. The next day with the aid of the infantry sent to his support, he pitched in and routed the rebels, capturing more than five thousand prisoners and putting to flight fifteen thousand or more, who skedaddled in such a hurry that they left behind all their cannon and supply wagons. The battle was anything but an April-fool joke.
Meade, Ord and Parke made a general assault on the works in front of Petersburg, April 2. It was Sunday morning. The roar of battle could be heard from away over on the Appomattox above City Point, all along the line. It was a magnificent sight to see the infantry going in. As the charge was being made, Gen. Meade sent Major Emory of his staff with a dispatch to Gen. Wright commanding the Sixth corps. I was directed to accompany the major. Gen. Wright was said to be hotly engaged in capturing intrenchments off to the left of Petersburg, and to reach him it would be necessary to make a wide circuit to the left and rear, or ride directly across the field where the battle was raging. Major Emory decided upon the latter course, and away we went.
The Johnnies, realizing that their time had come, were making a desperate defense of the works, and the shot and shell screeched over and under and around us on all sides as we rode the line of battle. One shell exploded directly under the major’s horse, throwing up a cloud of dirt and smoke, and for a moment I felt sure Gen. Meade had lost one of his aids. Then I heard the major shout:
“Come on. I’m all right.”
It was dangerous work. The infantry soldiers were falling on all sides. But we came out alive and reached Gen. Wright, who had broken through the outer lines and was pushing toward Petersburg.
The fall of Richmond! All Sunday night the rebels were getting out of Richmond and Petersburg. The backbone of the Confederacy was broken indeed. The news seemed too good to be true. We rode into Petersburg Monday morning, bright and early, and without dismounting, we kept on and immediately took up the line of march in pursuit of Lee’s army, which was now retreating up the Appomattox.
It was a hot chase – a sort of go-as-you-please. Of course when Richmond was evacuated, the boys in blue felt that the end was at hand. When the Confederate commander telegraphed to Jeff Davis that the “enemy” had broken the line in front of Petersburg, it was a cold day for C. S. A.
It is recorded that Jeff Davis was attending church when he received Lee’s dispatch, and that he quietly stole away without waiting for the doxology or the benediction. It was a clear case of “every man for himself.” The “president” didn’t whisper even to the brother in the next pew that it was time to flee from the wrath to come. No. Perhaps he had heard the echo of that familiar Yankee hymn:
“We’ll hang Jeff Davis to a sour apple-tree,
As we go marching on.”
The “president” made better time in getting away from the seat of government than was made by the braves in butternut. He did not draw a long breath till he had distanced the retreating Confederates and reached Danville. To stimulate his soldiers to deeds of daring – and to induce them to beat back the Union army if possible till he could make good his escape – Davis declared in a proclamation, issued on the wing at Danville, April 5, 1865, that “Virginia, with the help of the people, and by the blessings of Providence, shall be held and defended.”
“Let us,” he continued, “meet the foe with fresh defiance, and with unconquered and unconquerable hearts.”
Before his signature to the document was dry, Jeff was making a bee-line for Georgia. He was willing to meet the foe face to face on paper. “You hold Grant in check till I can get far enough South to establish a rallying-point,” was the burden of his messages to the rebel general when read between the lines. At all events, the president of the Southern Confederacy took to the woods, and was next heard of at Irwinsville, Georgia, May 11, 1865. Wilson’s troopers took the fugitive into camp on that day.
The circumstances of the capture of Jeff Davis have been the subject of heated controversy – in magazine articles and newspaper publications. Whatever may be the fact in respect of his wearing apparel at the time the Yankee cavalrymen overhauled the rebel president – whether he had on his wife’s petticoats or was clad in masculine attire – certain it is that in abandoning the “lost cause,” and leaving Lee and his followers to “meet the foe with fresh defiance,” while he skedaddled, the “rebel hero” – still idolized and worshiped by the solid South – made a sorry exhibition of himself.
On the chase up the Appomattox our boys were kept busy – in the saddle night and day – carrying dispatches to and from Meade’s headquarters. It was a very interesting period. Sheridan was neck-and-neck with Lee, while the grand old Army of the Potomac was hot on the rebel commander’s trail.
Gen. Meade was seriously ill for several days preceding the negotiations that led to the surrender. But he kept in the saddle most of the time, in spite of the request of the headquarters’ medical men, that he should “avoid all excitement!” It was strange advice to give under such circumstances. The hero of Gettysburg realized that the boys were knocking the bottom out of the Southern Confederacy, and he was determined to be in at the death.
Whenever there was heavy firing at the front, Meade would get out of the ambulance, in which he rode when compelled to leave the saddle, and call for his favorite horse “Baldy.” Then he would ask his son George, one of his aids, or Major Jay or Major Emory, to assist him into the saddle. Once mounted, the general seemed to have a way of shaking off his sickness. He would press on to the head of the column and make a personal reconnaissance. As soon as the rearguard of the rebels – left to check the Union advance while the Confederate wagon trains and artillery were hurried to the west – was brushed out of the way, and the line of march resumed, the general would return to his ambulance, at times completely exhausted.
April 4, 1865, was one of the hardest days of the chase. It was a forced march with only an occasional breathing spell when the advance was feeling its way along the roads leading toward Appomattox. That night we unsaddled with what we considered fair prospects of rest. But before we had settled down for sleep, a trooper dashed up to Meade’s headquarters. The general was so ill that he could scarcely hold up his head, but when told that Sheridan had intercepted the Confederates, and predicted the capture of Lee’s army if the Army of the Potomac would push to the front near Jettersville, Meade got out of bed and gave orders for the march to be resumed at two o’clock in the morning.
The boys were waiting for the wagons to come up with the hard tack and coffee, and the prospect of pushing on without grub was anything but transporting. Still when the time came to “fall in,” the men obeyed with a cheerfulness characteristic of the veterans of the gallant army that for four years had fought Lee’s soldiers with varied success.
The next morning Sheridan’s men – a scouting party under Gen. Davies, our brigade commander – played havoc with a Confederate wagon train that was “sifting west.” Nearly two hundred wagons were destroyed. It was hard for the Johnnies to witness the destruction of their supply train. Poor fellows, they needed all the grub they could get, and more, too. They fought desperately, but the battle was against them. The Federal column moved on, and the surrounding of Lee’s army was pushed on all sides. The boys in blue were hungry, but they kept in good spirits. “We can stand it if the rebs can,” was remarked now and then as the boys were ordered to move on just before the supply train would get up.
On the battlefield of Sailor’s Creek I picked up Gen. Lee’s order book. The last order copied into the book was dated Saturday, April 1, 1865, and, as I remember it, the order referred to the sending of re-enforcements from the works in front of Petersburg to oppose Sheridan’s advance on the Union left. The ground was strewn with the debris of the rebel headquarters’ train. Army wagons with spokes cut out of the wheels were overturned on both sides of the road.
“In the last ditch;”
“The C. S. A. is gone up;”
“We all can’t whip you all without something to eat,”
and other humorous inscriptions appeared on the canvas covers of the wagons. I wish I had held on to Lee’s order book. It would have been valuable to-day. But it was heavy, and I threw it aside.
April 9, 1865, while Sheridan was square across the road preventing Lee’s further advance without cutting his way through, and the Army of the Potomac was on the flank and rear, came the news that white flags were displayed along the rebel lines and that Grant and Lee were negotiating for the surrender of the Confederate army of Northern Virginia. Meade’s headquarters contingent was bivouacked just off the road leading to Appomattox Court House from Farmville.
“Lee’s going to surrender!”
The boys could scarcely credit the report that the Confederate commander had asked terms, for, somehow or other, after a week’s hard chase the Yankees had begun to fear that Lee would effect a junction with Johnston in North Carolina. But when an orderly from Grant’s headquarters dashed up and handed Meade a letter from the lieutenant-general confirming the report that Lee had accepted Grant’s terms, there was the greatest joy at headquarters.
The news spread like wildfire, and in a few minutes the tired soldiers were dancing with joy. I was broiling a confiscated chicken in the angle of a rail fence when the orderly rode up. When I was told of the tidings he had brought I threw the chicken as high as I could, kicked the fire in every direction, and shouted till my throat was sore.
Gen. Meade, with a few members of the escort of which I was one, rode into the Confederate lines and to Lee’s camp. The Southern commander had only a wall tent fly for headquarters. Longstreet was there and several others whom Meade had known in the old army. Meade and Lee conversed for a few minutes alone. In the meantime a sergeant of Meade’s escort and a sergeant of Lee’s headquarters guard entered into such a heated argument that the interference of several officers of both sides was necessary to prevent them from fighting to a finish.
As we were riding down the slope from Lee’s bivouac, a weather-stained Confederate, wearing an old slouch hat, a short butternut jacket, and with a dilapidated blanket wrapped about his shoulders, shouted to Meade. The commander of the Army of the Potomac did not recognize the man who hailed him and who held out his hand, until the rebel said:
“Don’t you know me, General? I’m Gen. Wise of Virginia.”
Then there was another handshake. Wise was the sorriest looking general I saw at the surrender. Lee and Longstreet and some of the others were clad in bright new uniforms, but Wise looked as though he had been rolled in the mud all the way from Petersburg.
After calling on Lee, Meade rode over to the Court House and congratulated Grant and Sheridan on the result. The Union generals seemed to enjoy the “love feast.”
There was joy and gladness on all sides. A majority of the rebels who surrendered at Appomattox accepted the inevitable with better grace than could have been expected of them after the desperate resistance they had made. But when you put food into a starving man’s mouth the chances favor his smothering his hatred if he has such feeling toward you.
“Dog gone it, that’s splendid coffee,” said a butternut clad veteran who shared my supper the night of the surrender. “You all overpowered us; we couldn’t hold out on wind any longer. I like this meat; I tell you, it’s good. I didn’t know I was so hungry; I must have got beyond the hunger point.”
Then came the order for the return. It was not “on to Richmond” this time, but “on to Washington.” We all knew that the war was over – that Sherman would make short work of the Confederate Army in the Carolinas under Johnston.
When we mounted our horses and rode back toward Burkesville station, leaving the provost marshal and a small force at Appomattox to parole the prisoners, it was conceded by both Yankee and rebel that the Army of the Potomac and the army of Northern Virginia would never again meet as enemies on the battlefield. The boys in blue felt that they had fought a good fight, won a glorious victory, and could now return to their homes proud to have been permitted to suffer and do battle under the flag of the Union.
It was a happy army that faced about at Appomattox and took up the march for Washington. The bands played, and the victorious Federals sang. The bivouacs at night were camp meetings on a large scale. Somehow the boys did not need as much sleep as was required when in winter quarters. Discipline was relaxed, and colonels and corporals, captains and privates talked over the results of the last campaign without any “red tape nonsense,” as the boys were wont to call a strict observance of military discipline when there was no fighting to do.
The song that was sung with the most expression on that homeward march, was a parody on “Dear Mother, I’ve come home to die,” the last word being changed to “eat.” Then there was that lively air:
“When Johnny comes marching home again,
Hurrah, hurrah!
When Johnny comes marching home again,
Hurrah, says I;
The lads and lassies, so they say,
With roses they will strew the way,
And we’ll all feel gay
When Johnny comes marching home.”
On the road between Farmville and Burkesville station I dismounted at a farmhouse and asked a little negro boy who stood near the fence with mouth and eyes wide open, for a drink of water. The lad seemed to be frightened, and ran away around the house.
“You, Julius, come here!” shouted a middle-aged lady who stepped out on the piazza. She had overheard my request for water. The young darky returned at the lady’s command.
“I’se ‘fraid dese Yankees,” he said.
“I don’t think they’ll molest you, Julius. Bring the gentleman a drink of water.”
I was invited to a seat on the piazza pending Julius’s expedition to the spring house, a rod or two back of the dwelling. He returned with a large gourd dipper filled with deliciously cool water. In the meantime three young ladies, daughters of the middle-aged lady, appeared on the piazza and were presented by their mother to the Yankee. Then Julius went to the spring to fill my canteen.
“I’m sorry we have nothing but water to offer you,” said the mother.
The young ladies also ventured to speak.
“The two armies, ours and yours, just took everything in the shape of provisions on the place.”
“Yes; and the soldiers found where we had stored a few hams and a sack of flour down in the woods.”
“And they made out they came across the place accidentally like. I believe Jeb, a brother of Julius, told the Yankees where we had buried the box with the hams and flour, for he hasn’t been seen on the plantation since.”
“I am really sorry for you, ladies. I will speak to Gen. Meade, and I am sure he will direct the commissary to supply you with something to eat.”
“I think we can hold out for another day,” said the mother. “My husband was in Longstreet’s corps, and he said when he galloped by here the other day that the Confederacy was played out, and that if something providential did not turn up on the side of Lee’s army they would all be gobbled up inside of ten days. His last words were: ‘If you can save me a dish of meat of some kind till I get home, do it; it may save my life.’”
“And we’re doing our best for papa.”
“Yes, we are. When the last Yankees marched by on the way to the surrender, we found we had one goose left – ”
“Yes; and we’ve got the goose yet, down in the cellar – ”
“Now, Miss Emma, you have told a Yankee about the goose, and papa’s chances for dinner when he comes home are mighty slim.”
“Dear sir, you will spare us?”
“Mr. Yankee, let us keep our goose?”
“I know you didn’t mean to rob us!”
“The goose is safe, ladies. Cook your goose for the family reunion, for I assure you that there isn’t a man in the Federal army mean enough to steal a goose under such circumstances, especially now that the war is over.”
“I feel relieved.”
“Oh! so much.”
“How kind you are.”
“The Yankees are not so black as our papers have painted them. I’m so rejoiced to know that we can save the goose.”
Just then Julius came bounding around the corner of the house. His hair fairly stood on end, and his eyes seemed starting from their sockets.
“Miss Julia! Miss Julia! Miss Julia!”
“What is it, Julius?”
“O, Miss Julia! Miss Julia!”
“Speak, you idiot!”
“De goose, Miss Julia, de goose! See dar, see dar! Look, dat Yankee gwine ober de fence yonder wid de goose you’s a-keepin’ for Massa Colonel Bob!” Sure enough, Julius was right. While the ladies had been entertaining me on the piazza a straggling cavalryman had entered the yard. He had filled his canteen at the spring house. Then he interviewed Julius. Next he slipped into the cellar and raised a tub that was bottom-side up on the cellar bottom.
Under the tub he found the goose, which he seized by the neck. In a few seconds he had jumped over the fence to where his horse was standing, and without paying any attention to my shouts for him to “stop or drop that goose,” the blue-coated robber put spurs to his steed and disappeared down the road.
The goose was gone. Col. Bob’s dinner was spoiled so far as that goose was concerned.
“Ladies – ”
“Don’t speak to me.”
“Nor me.”
“Nor me.”
“Nor me.”
“But I assure you – ”
“Yes, you assured us a few minutes ago.”
“I had misgivings all the time that Miss Emma would tell about the goose.”
“But, mother dear, don’t cry; I thought we could trust a gentleman.”
“So we could, but we should have known better than to trust a Yankee.”
I believe that I would have shot the bummer who confiscated that goose had he been within range of my revolver while I was under fire on that piazza. I never felt quite so mean in the presence of ladies before.
“Go and join your partner,” said the mother.
“Leave us, sir!” chorused the daughters.
What a predicament for a youthful soldier. There I stood, despised and hated by four ladies with whom I had been apparently on good terms a few moments before. Had a band of bushwhackers opened fire on me at that moment I should have been happy again.
The bushwhackers did not come, but Julius did. I shall never forget Julius.
“Miss Julia, dis yere Yankee doan’ know nuffin ‘bout stealin’ dat goose.”
“How do you know, nigger?”
“Cos’ what dat oder Yankee say.”
“What did he say?”
“He tole me ‘fi made de leas bit of holler so dat Yankee sittin’ on de porch wid you all see he, he would don’ cut my brack hed off wid he’s s’od. Deed he did, Miss Julia.”
“How did he know about the goose?”
“Spec I’se de nigger to blame. He axed me whar missus kept her pervisions, an’ fo’ I know’d what I do’n, I say, ‘Nuffin left but one ole goose, Massa.’ Den he say, ‘Whar dat goose?’ an’ what wor a poor nigger to do, Miss Julia?”
“We have done you an injustice, sir,” said the mother, again turning to me.
“Pardon us, sir,” said the younger ladies.
“Don’t mention it, ladies. I am so glad that I am relieved from the suspicion of complicity in the stealing of that goose, that I would stay and help cook a dinner to celebrate Col. Bob’s return were it not for the fact that I must go on and report to Gen. Meade.”
We parted very good friends. A goodly store of flour, meat, coffee and sugar was sent to the ladies from the Union commissary department, and no doubt Col. Bob reached home in time to share the rations with his charming family.
Although twenty-six years have come and gone since my experience on the piazza of that Virginia farmhouse, I cannot repress a feeling whenever I recall the circumstances, that I would be pleased to meet that “other Yankee” who did steal that goose and choke him till he cried “peccavi! ”