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XI.
Grant's overland campaign.
May-June, 1864.
I. Combinations of the spring campaign.
If one should seek to discover the cause of the indecisive character of the
Virginia campaigns, and why it was that for three years the Army of the Potomac, after each advance towards
Richmond, was doomed to see itself driven back in discomfiture, it might be thought that a sufficient explanation was furnished in the consideration of the inherent difficulty of the task, arising from the near equality of its adversary in material strength, and the advantage the
Confederates enjoyed in fighting defensively on such a theatre as
Virginia.
But to these weighty reasons must be added another, of a larger scope, and having relation to the general conduct of the war. Justice to the Army of the Potomac demands that this should here be stated, especially as the campaign on which I am about to enter will, happily, show the army under new auspices as regards this particular.
In
Virginia, the Army of the Potomac had not only to combat the main army of the
South, but an army that, by means of the interior lines held by the
Confederates, might be continually strengthened from the forces in the western zone, unless these should be under such constant pressure as to prevent their
