The fighting around Petersburg.
After the rout of the right wing of
Lee's army, it appeared possible to destroy or capture the whole of
Lee's army before it could move from position, and with that in view,
Grant ordered that as early as possible on the morning of the 2d, assaults should be made along the whole line—by
Parke, from the
Appomattox
[
175]
to the
Jerusalem Plank Road; by
Wright from the
Plank Road as far as his command extended; by
Ord, with the Army of the James, between him and
Humphreys, and by
Humphreys, upon the intrenchments about Burgess' Mill, whilst
Sheridan, with the cavalry and the Fifth Corps, was to sweep around and clear out everything to the
Appomattox River.
Longstreet, not having found out that ‘the Army of the James’ had been withdrawn from his front, though it had been withdrawn on the evening of March 27th, the seventh day before, remained on the
Richmond and Bermuda lines, under the impression that he was confronting that army, so that the protection of the whole line from the
Appomattox to Burgess' Mill, from twelve to fifteen miles in length, when assaulted by the concentrated strength of
Grant's army, devolved upon
Gordon's and
A. P. Hill's Corps, the greater part of which had, therefore, to be entrusted to the artillery, unsupported.
