March 8, 1864. |
March 23. |
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where he was checked by a superior force, with a battery.
Then he turned northward, in the direction of Stannardsville, skirmishing at times with Confederate cavalry; and then returned to camp, followed by a large number of refugees from slavery.
This menace of the railway communication with the Shenandoah Valley, and the attacks on Richmond, produced the greatest alarm.
When the danger disappeared, General Elzy,1 in command at the Confederate capital,
issued a congratulatory order, that produced a pleasant quietude in the public mind, which was but little disturbed again until Lieutenant-General Grant made his appearance, at the beginning of May, like a baleful meteor in the firmament.
We have seen that Lieutenant-General Grant, in his first order after assuming chief command, declared his Headquarters to be with the Army of the Potomac “until further orders.”
A week afterward he arrived
in Washington City from the West, with a portion of his domestic and military families, and went immediately to the Headquarters of General Meade at Culpepper Court-House, where, on the following day, the Army of the Potomac was reorganized by consolidating and reducing the five army corps to three, named the Second, Fifth, and Sixth.
These were respectively, in the order named, placed under the commands of Generals Hancock, Warren, and Sedgwick.2 Generals Sykes, Newton, French, Kenly, Spinola, and Meredith, were relieved and sent to Washington for orders.
General Burnside, who, since his retirement from the command of the Army of the Ohio, at Knoxville, in December, had been at Annapolis, in Maryland, reorganizing and recruiting his old Ninth Corps, was ready for the field at the middle of April.
His corps (composed partly of colored troops) was reviewed by the President on the 23d of that month, when it passed into Virginia and joined the Army of the Potomac.
With this accession of force, that army, at the close of April, numbered over one hundred thousand men. Re-enforcements had been pouring in during that month, and before its close Grant and Meade had perfected their arrangements for a grand advance of the Army of the Potomac and its auxiliaries.3
1 See page 896, volume II.
2 Hancock's (Second) corps consisted of four divisions, commanded respectively by Generals F. C. Barlow, J. Gibbon, D. B. Birney. and J. B. Carr. His brigade commanders were Generals A. S. Webb, J. P. Owen, J. H. Ward, A. Hayes, and G. Mott: and Colonels N. A. Miles, T. A. Smythe, R. Frank, J. R. Brooke, S. S. Carroll, and W. R. Brewster. Colonel J. C. Tidball was chief of artillery, and Lieutenant-Colonel C. H. Morgan was chief of staff.
Warren's (Fifth) corps consisted of four divisions, commanded respectively by Generals C. Griffin, J. C. Robinson, S. W. Crawford, and J. S. Wadsworth. The brigade commanders were Generals J. Barnes, J. J. Bartlett, R. B. Ayres. H. Baxter, L. Cutler, and J. C. Rice; and Colonels Leonard, Dennison, W. McCandless, J. W. Fisher, and Roy Stone. Lieutenant-Colonel H. C. Bankhead, chief of staff; Colonel C. S. Wainwright, chief of artillery. Sedgwick's (Sixth) corps comprised three divisions, commanded respectively by Generals H. G. Wright, G. W. Getty, and H. Prince. The brigade commanders were Generals A. T. A. Torbert, A. Shaler, F. Wheaton, T. H. Neill, A. L. Eustis, and D. A. Russell; and Colonels E. Upton, H. Burnham, and L. A. Grant. Chief of staff, Lieutenant-Colonel M. T. McMahon; chief of artillery, Colonel C. H. Tompkins. The reserve park of artillery was under the chief direction of General H. J. Hunt, chief of artillery of the Army of the Potomac, and under the immediate command of Colonel H. S. Burton. A brigade of engineers and the pontoon trains were placed in charge of Major J. C. Duane; and the vast park of supply-wagons were under the direction of General Rufus Ingalls, Chief Quartermaster. The cavalry of the entire army was consolidated, and General Philip H. Sheridan, of the Regular Infantry, was placed in command of it; and General Kilpatrick was assigned to the command of the cavalry of Sherman's army in Northern Georgia. General Pleasanton was ordered to report to General Rosecrans, in Missouri, where we have just observed him engaged in chasing Price out of that State.3 The staff of General Grant was nearly thirty less in number than that of General McClellan, and was composed of fourteen officers, as follows; Brigadier-General John A. Rawlins, chief of staff; Lieutenant-Colonel T. S. Bowers and Captain E. S. Parker, assistant adjutants-general; Lieutenant-Colonel C. B. Comstock, senior aid-de-camp; Lieutenant-Colonels Orville E. Babcock, F. T. Dent, Horace Porter, and Captain P. T. Hudson, aids-de-camp; Lieutenant-Colonel W. L. Dupp, assistant inspector-general; Lieutenant-Colonels W. R. Rowley and Adam Badeau, secretaries; Captain George K. Leet, assistant adjutantgeneral, in office at Washington; Captain H. W. Janes, assistant quartermaster, on duty at Headquarters, and First-Lieutenant William Dunn, acting aid-de-camp. General Meade's chief of staff was Major-General A. A. Humphreys, and Brigadier-General Seth Williams was his adjutant-general.
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