II.

THE GREAT THEATRE OF THE CIVIL WAR.

On to Richmond—Horace Greeley's Editorial Standard—The Conflict's Ebb and Flow—The Two Battles of Bull Run—Arlington—Manassas—McDowell against Beauregard—Lee and Jackson against Pope—Antietam—The Emancipation Proclamation—Fredericksburg—Burnside against Lee—Chancellorsville—Lee and Jackson against Hooker—Death of Stonewall Jackson—Guinney Station—The Wilderness—Mine Run—Grant's Southern March—Battles of the Wilderness—Spottsylvania—Hanover Court-House—Ashland—Richmond—The Capitol—Washington's Statues—Stonewall Jackson's Statue—Confederate White House—General Lee's House—The First House—St. John's Church—Patrick Henry—Libby Hill and Prison—Belle Isle—Rocketts—Hollywood Cemetery—Noted Graves—McClellan's Siege of Richmond—Drewry's Bluff—Chickahominy Swamps—Fair Oaks—Seven Days' Battles—Gaines' Mill—Cold Harbor—Malvern Hill—Harrison's Landing—Grant's Siege of Richmond—Second Battle of Cold Harbor—Bermuda Hundred—Petersburg—Capture of Richmond—Kilpatrick's Raid—Piedmont—Charlottesville—University of Virginia—Monticello—Thomas Jefferson—Shenandoah Valley—Cross Keys—Jackson's Exploits—Cedar Mountain—General Sheridan—Cedar Creek—Sheridan against Early—Luray Cavern—Battlefield of Gettysburg—Lee Marches into Pennsylvania—Hooker Resigns—Meade against Lee—Gettysburg Topography—Seminary Ridge—Cemetery Ridge—The Round Tops—Confederate Advance to Carlisle and the Susquehanna—Three Days' Battle—Reynolds Killed—The Round Tops Attacked—General Sickles Wounded in Peach Orchard—Ewell Repulsed at Cemetery—Pickett's Charge and Repulse—Cushing and Armistead Killed—High-Water Mark Monument—Lee Retreats—Gettysburg Monuments—Jenny Wade—National Cemetery—Lincoln's Immortal Dedication—Valley of Death—Massachusetts Color-Bearer—The Reunited Union.

ON TO RICHMOND.

Thus trumpeted William Cullen Bryant in "Our Country's Call," while the most powerful American editor of the time of the Civil War, Horace Greeley, raised his standard at the head of the New York Tribune's editorial page early in 1861 with the words "On to Richmond." The region between Washington and Richmond, and much of the adjacent country stretching southward beyond James River and northward into Pennsylvania, will always be historic because of the momentous movements, sanguinary conflicts and wonderful strategy of the great American Civil War from 1861 to 1865. We have described the environment of Chesapeake Bay, and now proceed to a consideration of this noted region west of the bay, where the tide of battle repeatedly ebbed and flowed. The first northern invasion of the Virginia Peninsula and the abortive siege of Richmond in the summer of 1862 were followed by McClellan's retreat, Pope's defeat and the southern invasion of Maryland, which was checked at Antietam in the autumn. The northern attacks at Fredericksburg in December and at Chancellorsville in the spring of 1863 were followed by the invasion of Pennsylvania, checked at Gettysburg, the "high-water mark" of the rebellion; and Grant's march down through "the Wilderness" in 1864, followed by his gradual advances south of the James, forced the evacuation of Richmond, and Lee's final surrender at Appomattox in 1865.

THE TWO BATTLES OF BULL RUN.

The main route from Washington to the South crossed the Potomac, then as now, by the "Long Bridge," passing in full view of the yellow Arlington House, fronted by its columned porch. This historic building was the home of General Robert E. Lee in his early life, the chief Confederate Commander during the Civil War. The estate is now a vast cemetery, and upon it and all about to the westward are the remains of the forts and earthworks erected for the defence of Washington. After the war began, in April, 1861, the Northern troops were gradually assembled in and around Washington; but there came an imperative demand from the country that they should go forth and give the Confederates battle and capture Richmond before their Congress could meet, the opening of the session being fixed for July 20th. The Southern armies were entrenched at Manassas Junction, west of Washington, and at Winchester to the northwest, and they were making forays almost in sight of Washington. General McDowell, with nearly forty thousand men, marched out of the Washington fortifications on July 17th to attack General Beauregard at Manassas. The Confederates brought their Winchester army hastily down, and took position along the banks of Bull Run, a tributary of the Occoquan, their lines stretching for about eight miles. McDowell attacked on the morning of the 21st, each side having about twenty-eight thousand available men. The conflict lasted with varying success most of the day, McDowell being finally beaten and retreating to Washington.

Thirteen months later, after McClellan's retreat from Richmond, was fought in almost the same place, on August 29 and 30, 1862, the second battle of Bull Run. General Pope had a considerable force in Northern Virginia, and when McClellan, whom Pope superseded, retreated from before Richmond, and started on his return from James River, Lee moved nearly his whole army up from Richmond, hoping to fall upon Pope before McClellan could join him. On August 22d the opposing forces confronted each other along the Rappahannock, when General Stuart, with the Confederate cavalry, made a raid around Pope's lines to the rear, reaching that general's headquarters and capturing his personal baggage, in which was his despatch book describing the position of the whole Northern army. This gave Lee such valuable information that on the 25th he sent Stonewall Jackson with thirty thousand men, who, by a forced march, went around the western side of the Bull Run Mountains, came east again by the Thoroughfare Gap, and on the night of the 27th was in Pope's rear, and had cut his railroad connections and captured his supplies at Manassas. Pope, discovering the flanking movement, began falling back towards Manassas, and Jackson then withdrew towards the Gap, waiting for Lee to come up. There were various strategic movements afterwards, with fighting on the 29th; and on the 30th the Confederate wings had enclosed as in a vise Pope's forces to the west of Bull Run, when, after some terrific combats, Pope retreated across Bull Run towards Washington. Pope had about thirty-five thousand men and Lee forty-six thousand engaged in this battle. During the night of September 2d Jackson made a reconnoissance towards Washington, in which the Union Generals Stevens and Kearney were killed at Chantilly, and the authorities became so apprehensive of an attack upon the Capital that they ordered the whole army to fall back behind the Washington defenses. Pope was then relieved, at his own request, and the command restored to McClellan. The Confederates marched northward across the Potomac and McClellan followed, ending with the battles of South Mountain and Antietam, later in September, when Lee retreated and recrossed the Potomac into Virginia on the 18th. The significant result of this conflict and withdrawal was the issue of the famous Emancipation Proclamation. President Lincoln had made a vow that if Lee was driven back from Maryland he would issue a proclamation abolishing slavery, which was done September 22, 1862.

FREDERICKSBURG AND THE WILDERNESS.

The route from Washington to Richmond skirts the Potomac for a long distance south of Alexandria, winding among hills and forests, crossing various broad creeks and bayous, among them the Occoquan, the outlet of Bull Run, and then diverges towards the Rappahannock. This is more historic ground, for the terrible battle of Fredericksburg was fought here in December, 1862, and the battle of Chancellorsville, to the westward, in May, 1863, where Stonewall Jackson lost his life. The "Wilderness" is to the southward of the Rappahannock, occupying about two hundred square miles, a plateau sloping to cultivated lowlands on every side. The original forests were long ago cut off, and a dense growth of scrub timber and brambles covered nearly the whole surface, with an occasional patch of woodland or a clearing. After the battle of Antietam the anxiety for another forward movement to Richmond led the Administration to remove McClellan, and then General Burnside took command. His troops crossed the Rappahannock in December to attack General Lee's Confederate position on the Heights of Marye, where they were strongly entrenched; but the attack failed, the shattered army after great carnage withdrawing to the north bank of the river, and it lay there for months in winter quarters. Burnside was superseded by General Hooker, and in May, 1863, the Northern army again crossed the Rappahannock at several fords above Fredericksburg and started for Richmond. Lee quickly marched westward from Fredericksburg, and Lee and Hooker faced each other at Chancellorsville. Then came another of Stonewall Jackson's brilliant flank movements. Chancellorsville is on the eastern border of the Wilderness, and Jackson, making a long detour to the south and west through that desolate region, got around and behind Hooker's right flank, surprised him, and sent General Howard's entire corps in panic down upon the rest of the Union forces, making the greatest surprise of the war. During that same night Jackson, after his victory, was accidentally shot by his own men, a blow from which the Confederacy never recovered. Twelve miles south of Fredericksburg, at Guinney Station, is the little house where Jackson died. He and his aides, after reconnoitering, had returned within the Confederate lines, and the pickets, mistaking them for the enemy, fired into the party. Several of his escort were killed and Jackson was shot in three places, an arm being shattered. Being put upon a litter one of the bearers stumbled, and Jackson was additionally injured by being thrown to the ground. The arm was amputated, but afterwards pneumonia set in, which was the immediate cause of his death. He lingered a week, dying May 10th, in his fortieth year, his last words, dreamily spoken, being: "Let us cross over the river and rest under the shade of the trees." It is said this loss of his ablest lieutenant had such an effect upon Lee that he afterwards aged rapidly, and his hair quickly whitened. The spot where Jackson was shot is alongside the Orange Plank Road, and is marked by a granite monument. Jackson is buried at Lexington, Virginia, where he had previously been a professor in the Military Academy. Hooker withdrew across the Rappahannock, Lee started northward, Hooker was succeeded by Meade, and the battle of Gettysburg was fought at the beginning of July.

Then came another movement towards Richmond, late in the year 1863. Meade marched down to the Wilderness in November, had heavy skirmishing and fought the battle of Mine Run on its western border, and then went back and into winter quarters. General Grant came from the West, took command, and early in May, 1864, started on his great march to Richmond through the Wilderness, with Lee constantly fighting on his right flank and front. There followed during that month a series of sanguinary battles, in this inhospitable region, in which the losses of the two armies exceeded sixty thousand men. While moving southward, Grant faced and fought generally westward. It took him ten days to progress a dozen miles, and he could only move during the lulls in the fighting, the advance being usually made by changing one corps after another from the right to the left by marching in the rear of the main body, thus gradually prolonging the left wing southward through the forbidding country. Lee pressed forward into the vacated space, fortifying and fighting, his object being to force Grant eastward and away from Richmond, which was towards the south. "More desperate fighting has not been witnessed upon this Continent," said Grant of this struggle in the Wilderness; and later he wrote to Washington the famous declaration of his intention "to fight it out on this line if it takes all summer." The whole of this desolate region south and west of Fredericksburg and down to Spottsylvania is filled with the remains of the fortifications constructed in these memorable battles. Grant said that "In every change of position or halt for the night, whether confronting the enemy or not, the moment arms were stacked the men entrenched themselves," adding, "It was wonderful how quickly they could construct defenses of considerable strength." Thus the way was worked, by shovel and shell and musket and axe, through the Wilderness. There is a plan afoot for acquiring these battlefields and the connecting roads, so as to preserve this historic ground as a public reservation.

The railway route to Richmond goes through the Wilderness, thinly peopled, sparsely cultivated, and exhibiting a few negro settlements, where they sun themselves alongside their cabins and watch the trains go by. There is an occasional horse or cow, but almost the only animals visible are the nimble-footed and hungry-looking "razor-backed" hogs that range the scrub timber in search of a precarious living. Once in awhile is seen an old homestead that has survived the ruin of the war, but the few buildings are generally most primitive, the favorite style being a small wooden cabin set alongside a huge brick chimney. It is said the chimney is first built, and if the draught is all right they then build the little cabin over against it and move in the family. The agriculture does not appear much better until Richmond is approached, where the surface of the country improves. At Hanover Court House are more signs of battlefields, for here McClellan had his early conflicts in besieging Richmond in 1862, while Grant came down from the Wilderness and had the battles of the North Anna near the end of May, 1864, and of Cold Harbor in June, after which he moved his army to the south side of James River. Ashland, sixteen miles north of Richmond, is in an attractive region, and is a favorite place of suburban residence. This was the birthplace of Henry Clay, in 1777, and is the seat of Randolph Macon College.

THE CITY OF RICHMOND.

Richmond, the capital of Virginia, has about one hundred and thirty thousand population, and occupies a delightful situation. The James River flows around a grand curve from the northwest to the south, and pours over falls and rapids, which display many little cascades among a maze of diminutive islands. There are on the northern bank two or three large hills and several smaller ones, and Richmond is built upon these, it is said like Rome upon her seven hills. The State Capitol and a broad white penitentiary crown two of the highest. The town was founded at the falls of the James in 1737, and the capital of Virginia was moved here from Williamsburg in 1779, when there was only a small population. The place did not have much history, however, until it became the Capital of the Confederacy, and then the strong efforts made to capture it and the vigorous defence gave it world-wide fame. Beginning in 1862 it was made an impregnable fortress, and its fall, when the Confederate flank was turned in 1865 through the capture of Petersburg, resulted from General Lee's retreat westward and his final surrender at Appomattox. When Lee abandoned Petersburg there was a panic in Richmond, with riot and pillage; the bridges, storehouses and mills were fired, and nearly one-third of the city burnt. It has since, however, been rebuilt in better style, and has extensive manufactures and a profitable trade.

The centre of Richmond is a park of twelve acres, surrounding the Capitol, a venerable building upon the summit of Shockoe Hill, and the most conspicuous structure in the city. It was built just after the American Revolution, the plan having been brought from France by Thomas Jefferson, and modelled from the ancient Roman temple of the Maison CarrÉe at Nismes, the front being a fine Ionic portico. From the roof, elevated high above every surrounding building, there is an excellent view, disclosing the grand sweep of the river among the islands and rapids, going off to the south, where it disappears among the hills behind Drewry's Bluff, below the town. The square-block plan with streets crossing at right angles is well displayed, and the abrupt sides of some of the hills, where they have been cut away, disclose the high-colored, reddish-yellow soils which have been so prolific in tobacco culture, and give the scene such brilliant hues, as well as dye the river a chocolate color in times of freshet. The city spreads over a wide surface, and has populous suburbs on the lower lands south of the James. This Capitol was the meeting-place of the Confederate Congress, and the locality of all the statecraft of the "Lost Cause." It contains the battle-flags of the Virginia troops and other relics, and in a gallery built around the rotunda are hung the portraits of the Virginia Governors and of the three great military chiefs, Lee, Johnston and Jackson. Upon the floor beneath is Houdon's famous statue of Washington, made while he was yet alive. In 1785, the talented French sculptor accompanied Franklin to this country to prepare the model for the statue, which had been ordered by the Virginia Government. He spent two weeks at Mount Vernon with Washington, taking casts of his face, head and upper portion of the body, with minute measurements, and then returned to Paris. The statue was finished in 1788, and is regarded as the most accurate reproduction of Washington existing. A statue of Henry Clay and a bust of Lafayette are also in the rotunda.

On the esplanade north of the Capitol is Crawford's bronze equestrian statue of Washington upon a massive granite pedestal, one of the most attractive and elaborate bronzes ever made. The horse is half thrown upon his haunches, giving the statue exceeding spirit, while upon smaller pedestals around stand six heroic statues in bronze of Virginia statesmen of various periods—Patrick Henry, Thomas Jefferson, Thomas Nelson, George Mason, Andrew Lewis and Chief Justice John Marshall—the whole adorned with appropriate emblems. This artistic masterpiece was constructed at a cost of $260,000. In the centre of the esplanade is Foley's bronze statue of Stonewall Jackson, sent from London in 1875 by a number of his English admirers as a gift to the State of Virginia. It is of heroic size, standing upon a pedestal of Virginia granite, and is a striking reproduction. The inscription is: "Presented by English gentlemen as a tribute of admiration for the soldier and patriot, Thomas J. Jackson, and gratefully accepted by Virginia in the name of the Southern people." Beneath is inscribed in the granite the remark giving his sobriquet, which was made at the first battle of Bull Run in 1862, where Jackson commanded a brigade. At a time when the day was apparently lost, his troops made so firm a stand that some one, in admiration, called out the words that became immortal: "Look, there is Jackson standing like a stone wall!" A short distance from the Capitol is the "Confederate White House," a square-built dwelling, with a high porch in the rear and a small portico in front. Here lived Jefferson Davis during his career as President of the Confederacy; it is now a museum of war relics. Nearby is St. Paul's Episcopal Church, where Davis was attending service on the eventful Sunday morning in April, 1865, when he was brought the fateful telegram from General Lee which said that Richmond must be immediately evacuated. In the central part of the residential quarter, on Franklin Street, is the plain brick house which during the Civil War was the home of General Lee. It is related that after the Appomattox surrender, when he returned to this house, the people of Richmond got an idea that he was suffering privations and his family needed the necessaries of life. His son, Fitz Hugh Lee, afterwards said that the people then vied with each other in sending him everything imaginable. So generous were the gifts that the upper parts of the house were filled with barrels of flour, meats and many other things, and the supplies became so bountiful that Lee directed their distribution among the poor. This house is now occupied by the Virginia Historical Society. A magnificent equestrian statue of General Lee was erected on Park Avenue in 1890.

Some Richmond memorials, however, antedate the Civil War. Its "first house"—a low, steep-roofed stone cabin on the Main street, said to have been there when the town site was first laid out—is an object of homage. The popular idea is that the Indian King Powhatan originally lived in this house, but it was probably constructed after his time. Not far away, upon Richmond or Church Hill, stands St. John's Church among the old gravestones in a spacious churchyard. It was built in 1740—a little wooden church with a small steeple. Here the first Virginian Convention was held which paved the way for the Revolution in 1775, and listened to Patrick Henry's impassioned speech—"Give me liberty or give me death." The pew in which he stood while speaking is still preserved. An adjoining eminence is called Libby Hill, where lived Luther Libby, who owned most of the land thereabout. Under its shadow was the Libby Prison of the Civil War, since removed to Chicago for exhibition. It had been a tobacco warehouse, occupied by Libby Co., but during the war it held at various times over fifty thousand Northern prisoners. All the captured soldiers were first taken to Libby, the commissioned officers remaining there, while the privates were sent to points in the interior. The most noted event in the history of this prison was the boring of a tunnel through the eastern wall, in February, 1864, by which one hundred and nine prisoners, led by Colonel Streight, managed to escape into an adjoining stable and storehouse, and though more than half of them were recaptured, the others got safely out of Richmond and into the Union lines.

The water power of the James River supplies huge flour mills and other factories, and alongside the stream are the extensive Tredegar Iron Works at the base of Gamble Hill, one of the largest iron and steel works in the Southern States. Here were made the Confederate cannon, shot and shell, and the primitive armor plates for their few warships. This hill also overlooks the James River and Kanawha Canal, an interior water way going westward beyond the Alleghenies. In mid-river above is Belle Isle, a broad, flat island, which during the war was a place of imprisonment for private soldiers, but upon it is now an iron mill. Along the lower river are the wharves and shipping, in the section called Rocketts, and here are also the tobacco storehouses and factories, the chief Richmond industry, for it is the world's leading tobacco mart, receiving and distributing most of the product of the rich soils of Virginia, Kentucky and Carolina. The pungent odor generally pervades the town, for whichever way the wind may blow it wafts the perfume of a tobacco or cigarette factory. The Tobacco Exchange is the business centre, and this industry is of the first importance. The modern-built City Hall, adjacent to the Capitol Park, is one of Richmond's finest buildings.

In the western suburbs, upon the river bank, and in a lovely position, is the famous Hollywood Cemetery, the terraced sides of its ravines being occupied by mausoleums and graves, while in front the rushing rapids roar a requiem for the dead. The foliage is luxuriant; and, while occupying only about eighty acres, it is a most beautiful burial-place. Here are interred two Virginia Presidents—James Monroe and John Tyler. An elaborate monument marks the former, and a magnificent tree is planted at Tyler's grave—his daughter, buried nearby, having for a monument a tasteful figure of the Virgin. The Hollywood Cemetery Association is to place a monument on Tyler's grave. Here are also buried Confederate Generals A.P Hill, J.E B. Stuart, the dashing cavalryman, and George E. Pickett, who led the desperate Confederate charge of the Virginia Division at Gettysburg. It also contains the graves of the eccentric John Randolph of Roanoke; Commodore Maury, the navigator; Henry A. Wise, Governor of Virginia when the State seceded, and Thomas Ritchie, long editor of the Richmond Enquirer, a most powerful writer and political leader in the early part of the nineteenth century, who is regarded in Virginia as the "Father of the Democratic Party." There are crowded into this cemetery in one place twelve thousand graves of Confederate soldiers, and in the centre of the ghastly plot there rises a huge stone pyramid, ninety feet high, erected as a memorial by the Southern women. Vines overrunning it almost conceal the rough joints of the stones. No name is upon it, for it was built as a monument for the unnamed dead. On three sides are inscriptions; on one "To the Confederate Dead;" on another "Memoria in Æterna," and on a third "Numini et PatriÆ Asto." As they fell on the adjacent battlefields or died in the hospitals, unclaimed, they were brought here and buried in rows. In one urgent, terrible season, time not being given to prepare separate graves, the bodies were interred on the hillside in long trenches. This sombre pyramid and its immediate surroundings are impressive memorials of the great war. From any of the Richmond hills can be seen other grim mementos. Almost all the present city parks were then army hospitals or cemeteries; all the chief highways lead out to battlefields, and most of them in the suburbs are bordered with the graves of the dead of both armies. All around the compass the outlook is upon battlefields, and on all sides but the north upon cemeteries.

McCLELLAN'S SIEGE OF RICHMOND.

The great memory of Richmond for all time will be of the Civil War, when for three years battles raged around it. The first movement against the city was McClellan's siege in 1862, and the environs show abundant remains of the forts, redoubts and long lines of earthworks by which the Confederate Capital was so gallantly defended. The earliest attack was by Union gunboats in May, 1862, against the batteries defending Drewry's Bluff on James River, seven miles below the town, the defensive works being so strong that little impression was made, but enough was learned to prevent any subsequent naval attack there. McClellan came up the Peninsula between James and York Rivers, approached Richmond from the east, and extended his army around to the north, enveloping it upon a line which was the arc of a circle, from seven miles east to five miles north of the city. The Chickahominy flows through a broad and swampy depression in the table-land north and east of Richmond, bordered by meadows, fens and thickets of underbrush. It thus divided McClellan's investing army, and the first great battle near Richmond was begun by the Confederates, who took advantage of a heavy rain late in May which had swollen the river and swamps. They fell upon the Union left wing on May 31st, and the indecisive battle of Fair Oaks, in which the losses were ten thousand men, was fought southwest of the Chickahominy. General Joseph E. Johnston, the Confederate Commander, was badly wounded, and General Lee succeeded him, continuing in command until the war closed. Extensive cemeteries now mark this battlefield among the swamps. During June the heat and malaria filled McClellan's hospitals with fever cases, and he had to move the greater portion of his army to higher ground north of the Chickahominy, where he erected protective earthworks. These still exist, with the formidable ranges of opposing Confederate works on the south side of the river.

One of the most brilliant Confederate movements of the war followed. McClellan's right wing stretched around to the village of Mechanicsville, five miles north of Richmond, and Lee determined to overwhelm this wing. Stonewall Jackson had been driving the Union troops out of the Shenandoah Valley northwest of Richmond, and late in June began a combined movement with Lee's army at Richmond. Longstreet and Hill crossed the Chickahominy above Mechanicsville and attacked the Union right, beginning the "Seven Days' Battles," lasting from June 25 to July 1, 1862. Jackson was to have got down the same day from the Shenandoah Valley, but his march was delayed, and this gave time for McClellan to withdraw his wing and extensive baggage trains across the swamps below, the stubborn defense by his rear guards making the fierce conflict of Gaines' Mill, on the second day, during which Jackson, coming from the northward and joining the others, compelled the Union lines to change front, the contest thus turning into the first battle of Cold Harbor, in which the rear held their ground until the retreat was completed across the Chickahominy, and withdrew, destroying roads and bridges behind them. McClellan then made a further retreat, for which these obstructive tactics gave time, across the White Oak Swamp down the river, moving on a single road, leading to higher ground, which was held by hasty defenses. The Confederate attacks upon this new line made the battles of Savage Station, Charles City Cross Roads, and Frazier's Farm, the pursuit being checked long enough to permit another retreat and the formation of lines of defense on Malvern Hill, fifteen miles southeast of Richmond, adjoining James River. The Confederates again attacked, but met a disastrous check; and, wearied by a week of battles and marches, they then desisted, closing the seven days' fighting, in which both sides were worn out, and the losses were forty thousand men. McClellan's army, having retreated from around Richmond, afterwards withdrew farther down James River to Harrison's Landing, and here they rested. Subsequently they were removed by vessels to Washington for the later campaign which resulted in the second battle of Bull Run, McClellan being superseded for a brief period by Pope. This brilliant Confederate movement against McClellan raised the siege and relieved Richmond, emboldening them to make their subsequent aggressive campaigns across the Potomac, which were checked at Antietam and at Gettysburg.

GRANT'S SIEGE OF RICHMOND.

There were no Union attacks directly against Richmond in 1863. The second great movement upon the Confederate Capital began in June, 1864, when Grant came down through the Wilderness, as already described, and attacked the Confederates at Cold Harbor. Lee was entrenched there in almost the same defensive position occupied by McClellan's rear when protecting his retreat across the Chickahominy two years before. Grant made little impression, but in a brief and bloody battle lost fifteen thousand men. He then turned aside from this almost impregnable position to the northeast of Richmond, went south to the James River, and, crossing over, started a new attack from a different quarter. This removed the seat of war to the south of Richmond, and in September, 1864, General Butler's Unionist troops from Bermuda Hundred captured Fort Harrison, a strong work on the northeast side of the James, opposite Drewry's Bluff, and not far from Malvern Hill. The campaign then became one of stubborn persistence. Throughout the autumn and winter Grant gradually spread his lines westward around Petersburg, so that the later movements were more a siege of that city than of Richmond. City Point, at the mouth of the Appomattox, flowing out from Petersburg to the James, became his base of supplies. As the Union lines were extended steadily westward, one railway after another, leading from the far South up to Petersburg and Richmond, was cut off, and Lee was ultimately starved out, forcing the abandonment of Petersburg in the early spring of 1865, and the evacuation of Richmond on April 3d, with the retreat of Lee westward, and the final surrender at Appomattox six days later, causing the downfall of the Confederacy, and ending the war.

From the top of Libby Hill in Richmond the route is still pointed out by which the swiftly moving Union troops, after that fateful Sunday of the evacuation, advanced over the level lands from Petersburg towards the burning city. The bridges across the James were burnt, and acres of buildings in the business section were in flames when they came to the river bank and found that the greater portion of the affrighted people had fled. The Yankees quickly laid a pontoon bridge, crossed to Shockoe Hill, rushed up to the Capitol, and raised the Union "Stars and Stripes" on the roof, replacing the Confederate "Stars and Bars." Then they went vigorously to work putting out the fires, and the new infusion of life given the city by its baptism of blood imparted an energy which has not only restored it, but has given it an era of great prosperity. It is a curious fact that the nearest approach any Northern troops made to Richmond during the progress of the war was in March, 1864. A precursor to Grant's march through the Wilderness was a dashing cavalry raid from the northward, the troopers crossing the Chickahominy, then unguarded, and advancing to a point about one mile from the city limits. Here they met some resistance, and, learning of defensive works farther ahead, General Kilpatrick, who commanded the raiders, retreated. General Lee's troops were then fifty miles away from Richmond, guarding the lines along the Rappahannock.

PIEDMONT AND THE SHENANDOAH VALLEY.

In the great strategic movements of the opposing armies of the Civil War they repeatedly traversed a large part of Virginia and Maryland to the northwest of the route between Washington and Richmond. Like the general coastal formation east of the Alleghenies, Virginia rises into successive ridges parallel with the mountains. The first range of low broken hills stretching southwest from the Potomac are called in different parts the Kittoctin, Bull Run and other mountains extending down to the Carolina boundary. From these, what is known as the Piedmont district stretches all across the State, and has a width of about twenty-five miles to the base of the Blue Ridge, being a succession of picturesque valleys and rolling lands, the general elevation gradually increasing towards the northwest, where it is bordered by the towering Blue Ridge and its many spurs and plateaus, with passages through at various gaps. The Blue Ridge is elevated about fifteen hundred feet at the Potomac, but Mount Marshall, at Front Royal, rises nearly thirty-four hundred feet, and the Peaks of Otter, farther southwest, are much higher. Beyond this is the great Appalachian Valley, which stretches from New England to Alabama, the section here being known as the "Valley of Virginia," and its northern portion as the Shenandoah Valley. This is a belt of rolling country, with many hills and vales, diversified by streams that wind among the hillsides, and having a varying breadth of ten to fifty miles in different parts. Beyond it, to the northwest, are the main Allegheny Mountain ranges. The opposing troops marched and fought over all this country in connection with the greater military movements, and here was the special theatre of Stonewall Jackson's exploits and his wonderful marches and quick manoeuvres which made his troops proudly style themselves his "foot cavalry." The memory of Jackson is cherished by the Southern people more than that of any other of their leaders in the Civil War, and his brilliant exploits and inopportune death have made him their special hero.

In the Piedmont region, to the southeast and in front of the Blue Ridge, are the towns of Leesburg, Manassas, Warrenton, Culpepper, Orange and Charlottesville, all well known in connection with the opposing military movements. Charlottesville, about sixty-five miles northwest of Richmond, in a beautiful situation, was an important Confederate base of supplies. Here are now about six thousand people, and the town has its chief fame as the seat of the University of Virginia and the home of Thomas Jefferson. The University was founded mainly through the exertions of Jefferson, and has some five hundred students. Its buildings are a mile out of town, and the original ones were constructed from Jefferson's designs and under his supervision, the chief being the Rotunda, recently rebuilt, and the modern structures for a Museum of Natural History and an Observatory. Jefferson was proud of this institution, and in the inscription which he prepared for his tomb described himself as the "author of the Declaration of Independence, and of the statute of Virginia for religious freedom, and father of the University of Virginia." Among its most famous students was Edgar Allan Poe, and a fine bronze bust of him was unveiled at the University in 1899, on the fiftieth anniversary of his death. Thomas Jefferson lived at Monticello, the old house being an interesting specimen of early Virginia architecture, and standing on a hill southeast of the town. Here he died just fifty years after the Declaration was promulgated, July 4, 1826, and he is buried in the family graveyard near the house. Monticello is now celebrated for its native wines.

The Shenandoah Valley during the war was noted for the way in which the opposing forces chased each other up and down, with repeated severe battles. Here was fought, in June, 1862, the battle of Cross Keys, near the forks of the Shenandoah. Jackson had previously retreated up the Valley, but by a series of brilliant movements, begun after the battle of Fair Oaks before Richmond, he was able to meet and defeat in detail the various armies under Banks, Fremont, McDowell and Shields, thus managing to foil or hold in check seventy thousand men, while his own troops were never more than twenty thousand. Then coming southward out of the Valley, he joined in turning McClellan's right wing before Richmond at the end of June, afterwards following up Banks in August, and defeating him at Cedar Mountain, near Culpepper; then joining in the defeat of Pope at the second battle of Bull Run; then capturing Harper's Ferry and eleven thousand men September 15th, and finally taking part in the battle of Antietam two days later. When Grant began his siege of Richmond after the second battle of Cold Harbor, in 1864, he made General Sheridan commander of the troops in the Shenandoah Valley, and fortune turned. Sheridan opposed Early, and in September and October had a series of brilliant victories, the last one at Cedar Creek, where he turned a rout into a victory by his prompt movements. Sheridan had been in Washington, and came to Winchester, "twenty miles away," where he heard "the terrible grumble and rumble and roar" of the battle, and made his noted ride, the exploit being so conspicuous that he received the thanks of Congress. Early in 1865 he made a cavalry raid from Winchester, in the Valley, down to the westward of Richmond, around Lee's lines, and rejoined the army at Petersburg, having destroyed the James River and Kanawha Canal and cut various important railway connections in the Confederate rear. The Shenandoah Valley to-day is very much in its primitive condition of agriculture, but has been opened up by railway connections which develop its resources, and its great present attraction is the Cave of Luray. This cavern is about five miles from the Blue Ridge, and some distance southwest of Front Royal. It is a compact cavern, well lighted by electricity, and is more completely and profusely decorated with stalactites and stalagmites than any other in the world. Some of the chambers are very imposing, and all the more important formations have been appropriately named. The scenery of the neighborhood is picturesque, and the cavern has many visitors.

THE BATTLEFIELD OF GETTYSBURG.

In considering the great theatre of the Civil War, attention is naturally directed to the chief contest of all, and the turning-point of the rebellion, the battle of Gettysburg, fought at the beginning of July, 1863. After the victory at Chancellorsville in May the Confederates determined to carry the war northward into the enemy's country. Gettysburg is seven miles north of the southern boundary of Pennsylvania, and over forty miles from the Potomac River. To the westward is the long curving range of the South Mountain, and beyond this the great Appalachian Valley, a continuation of the Shenandoah Valley, crossing Central Pennsylvania in a curve, and here called the Cumberland Valley. In the latter are two prominent towns, Chambersburg in Pennsylvania, and Hagerstown in Maryland, on the Potomac. General Lee, in preparation for the march northward, gathered nearly ninety thousand men at Culpepper in Virginia, including Stuart's cavalry force of ten thousand. General Hooker's Union army, which had withdrawn across the Rappahannock after Chancellorsville, was then encamped opposite Fredericksburg, and one hundred and fifty miles south of Gettysburg. Lee started northward across the Potomac, but Hooker did not discover it for some days, and then rapidly followed. The Confederates crossed between June 22d and 25th, and concentrated at Hagerstown, in the Cumberland Valley, up which they made a rapid march, overrunning the entire valley to the Susquehanna River, and appearing opposite Harrisburg and Columbia. Hooker, being late in movement, crossed the Potomac lower down than Lee, on June 28th, thus making a northern race, up the curving valleys, with Lee in advance, but on the longer route of the outer circle. There was a garrison of ten thousand men at Harper's Ferry on the Potomac, and Hooker asked that they be added to his army; but the War Department declined, and Hooker immediately resigned, being succeeded by General George G. Meade, who thus on the eve of the battle became the Union commander.

There are two parallel ridges bordering the plain on which Gettysburg stands. The long Seminary Ridge, stretching from north to south about a mile west of the town, gets its name from the Lutheran Theological Seminary standing upon it; and the Cemetery Ridge to the south of the town, which partly stretches up its slopes, has on its northern flat-topped hill the village cemetery, wherein the principal grave then was that of James Gettys, after whom the place was named. There is an outlying eminence called Culp's Hill farther to the east, making, with the Cemetery Ridge, a formation bent around much like a fish-hook, with the graveyard at the bend and Culp's Hill at the barb, while far down at the southern end of the long straight shank, as the ridge extends for two miles away, with an intervening rocky gorge called the Devil's Den, there are two peaks, formed of tree-covered crags, known as the Little Round Top and the Big Round Top. These long parallel ridges, with the intervale and the country immediately around them, are the battlefield, which the topographical configuration well displays. It covers about twenty-five square miles, and lies mainly southwest of the town.

It was on June 28th that General Meade unexpectedly assumed command of the Union army, and he was then near the Potomac. General Ewell with the Confederate advance guard had gone up the Cumberland Valley as far as Carlisle, and his troopers were threatening Harrisburg. Nobody had opposed them, and the Confederate main body, which had got much ahead of Hooker, was at Chambersburg. Lee being far from his base, and hearing of the Union pursuit, then determined to face about and cripple his pursuers, fixing upon Gettysburg as the point of concentration. He ordered Ewell to march south from Carlisle, and the other commanders east from Chambersburg through the mountain passes. The Union cavalry advance under General Buford reached Gettysburg on June 30th, ahead of the Confederates, and Meade's army was then stretched over the ground for more than forty miles back to the Potomac, all coming forward by forced marches. As soon as Meade became aware of Lee's changed tactics he concluded that this extended formation was too risky, and decided to concentrate in a strong position upon the Pipe Creek hills in Maryland, about fifteen miles south of Gettysburg, and issued the necessary orders. Thus the battle opened, with each army executing a movement for concentration.

THE GREAT BATTLE.

The battle began on July 1st, the Union Cavalry, which had gone out to the west and north of Gettysburg, becoming engaged with the Confederate advance approaching the town from the passes through the South Mountain. The cavalry, at first victorious, was soon overwhelmed by superior numbers, and infantry supports arrived, under General Reynolds; but he was killed, and they were all driven back and through Gettysburg to the cemetery and Culp's Hill, which were manned by fresh troops that had come up. Meade was then at Pipe Creek, laying out a defensive line, but when he heard of Reynolds' death and the defeat, he sent General Hancock forward to take command, who decided that the Cemetery Ridge was the place to give battle. Ewell had in the meantime extended the Confederate left wing around to the east of Culp's Hill and held Gettysburg, but active operations were suspended, and the night was availed of by both sides to get their forces up and into position, which was mainly accomplished by morning.

When the second day, July 2d, opened, the armies confronted each other in line of battle. The Union troops were along the Cemetery Ridge and the Confederates upon the Seminary Ridge, across the intervale to the west, their lines also stretching around through Gettysburg to the north of the cemetery, and two miles east along the base of Culp's Hill. In the long intervening valley, and in the ravines and upon the slopes of the Cemetery Ridge and Culp's Hill, the main battle was fought. The attack began by General Longstreet advancing against the two Round Tops, but after a bloody contest he was repulsed. General Sickles, who held the line to the south of the Little Round Top, then thought he could improve his position by advancing a half-mile into the valley towards the Seminary Ridge, thus making a broken Union line, with a portion dangerously thrust forward. The enemy soon took advantage of this, and fell upon Sickles, front and flank, almost overwhelming his line in the "Peach Orchard," and driving it back to the adjacent "Wheat Field." Reinforcements were quickly poured in, and there was a hot conflict, Sickles being seriously wounded and his troops almost cut to pieces. About the same time Ewell made a terrific charge out of Gettysburg upon the Cemetery and Culp's Hill, with the "Louisiana Tigers" and other troops, effecting a lodgement, although the defending soldiers wrought great havoc by a heavy cannonade. The Union gunners on Little Round Top ultimately cleared the "Wheat Field," and then the combatants rested. Lee was much inspirited by his successes, and determined to renew the attack next morning.

Upon the third and last day, July 3d, General Meade opened the combat early in the morning by driving out Ewell's forces, who had effected a lodgement on Culp's Hill. General Lee did not learn of this, but he was full of the idea that both the Union centre and right wing had been weakened the previous day, and during the night he planned an attack in front, to be accompanied by a cavalry movement around the Union right to assail the rear, thus following up Ewell's supposed advantage. To give Stuart with the cavalry time to get around to the rear, the front attack was not made until afternoon. During the morning each side got cannon into position, Lee having one hundred and twenty guns along Seminary Ridge, and Meade eighty in the Cemetery and southward, along a low, irregular stone pile, forming a sort of rude wall bordering the road leading from Gettysburg south to Taneytown, in Maryland. The action began about one o'clock in the afternoon, when the Confederates opened fire, and the most terrific artillery duel of the war took place across the intervening valley, six guns being discharged every second. The troops suffered little, as they kept down in the ground, but several Union guns were dismounted. After two hours deafening cannonade Lee ordered his grand attack, the celebrated charge by General Pickett, a force of fourteen thousand men with brigade front advancing across the valley. They marched swiftly, and had a mile to go, but before they were half-way across all the available Union guns had been trained upon them. Their attack was directed at an umbrella-shaped clump of trees on the Cemetery Ridge at a low place where the rude stone wall made an angle, with its point outside. General Hancock commanded this portion of the Union line. The grape and canister of the Union cannonade ploughed furrows through Pickett's ranks, and when his column got within three hundred yards, Hancock opened musketry fire with terrible effect. Thousands fell, and the brigades broke in disorder; but the advance, headed by General Armistead on foot, continued, and about one hundred and fifty men leaped over the stone piles at the angle to capture the Union guns. Lieutenant Cushing, mortally wounded in both thighs, ran his last serviceable gun towards the wall, and shouting to his commander, "Webb, I will give them one more shot!" he fired the gun and died. Armistead put his hand on the cannon, waved his sword, and called out, "Give them the cold steel, boys!" then, pierced by bullets, he fell dead alongside of Cushing. Both lay near the clump of trees, about thirty yards inside the wall, their corpses marking the farthest point to which Pickett's advance penetrated. There was a hand to hand conflict; Webb was wounded, and also Hancock, and the slaughter was dreadful. The Confederates were overwhelmed, and not one-fourth of the gallant charging column, composed of the flower of the Virginia troops, escaped, the remnant retreating in disorder. Stuart's cavalry failed to coÖperate as intended, having met the Union cavalry about four miles to the east of Gettysburg, and the conflict ensuing prevented their attacking the Union rear. After Pickett's retreat there was a general Union advance, closing the combat.

The point within the angle of the stone wall where Cushing and Armistead fell has been commemorated by what is known as the "High-Water Mark Monument," for it was placed at the point reached by the top of the flood-tide of the rebellion, as afterwards there was a steady ebb. During the night of July 3d Lee began a retreat, and aided by heavy rains, usually following great battles, the Confederates next day withdrew through the mountain passes towards Hagerstown, and afterwards escaped across the Potomac. Upon the day of Lee's retreat, Vicksburg surrendered to General Grant, and these two events began the Confederacy's downfall. There were engaged in the battle of Gettysburg about eighty thousand men on each side, the Union army having three hundred and thirty-nine cannon and the Confederates two hundred and ninety-three. It was the largest battle of the Civil War in the actual numbers engaged, and one of the most hotly contested. The Union loss was twenty-three thousand and three killed, wounded and prisoners, and the Confederate loss twenty-three thousand seven hundred and sixty-eight.

THE GETTYSBURG MONUMENTS.

The battlefield of Gettysburg is better marked, both topographically and by monuments, than probably any other battlefield in the world. Over a million dollars have been expended on the grounds and monuments. The "Gettysburg Battlefield Memorial Association," representing the soldiers engaged, has marked all the important points, and the tracts along the lines, over four hundred and fifty acres, have been acquired, so as to thoroughly preserve all the landmarks where the most important movements were executed. There are some five hundred monuments upon the field, placed with the utmost care in the exact localities, and standing in woods or on open ground, by the roadsides, on stony heights and ridges in gardens, and of all designs, executed in bronze, marble, granite, on boulders and otherwise. Marking-posts also designate the positions of the various organizations in the opposing armies. To the north and west of Gettysburg is the scene of the first day's contest, but the more interesting part is to the southward. Ascending the Cemetery Hill, there is passed, by the roadside, the house of Jenny Wade, the only woman killed in the battle, accidentally shot while baking bread. The rounded Cemetery Hill is an elevated and strong position having many monuments, and here, alongside the little village graveyard, the Government established a National Cemetery of seventeen acres, where thirty-five hundred and seventy-two soldiers are buried, over a thousand being the unknown dead. A magnificent battle monument is here erected, surmounted by a statue of Liberty, and at the base of the shaft having figures of War, History, Peace and Plenty. This charming spot was the centre of the Union line, then a rough, rocky hill. The cemetery was dedicated in November, 1863, Edward Everett delivering the oration, and the monument on July 1, 1869. At the cemetery dedication President Lincoln made the famous "twenty-line address" which is regarded as the most immortal utterance of the martyr President, and has become an American classic. The British Westminster Review described it as an oration having but one equal, in that pronounced upon those who fell during the first year of the Peloponnesian War, and as being its superior, because "natural, fuller of feeling, more touching and pathetic, and we know with an absolute certainty that it was really delivered." The President was requested to say a few words by way of dedication, and drawing from his pocket a crumpled piece of paper on which he had written some notes, he spoke as follows:

"Fourscore and seven years ago our fathers brought forth upon this continent a new Nation, conceived in liberty and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal. Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation or any nation, so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battlefield of that war. We are met to dedicate a portion of it as the final resting-place of those who here gave their lives that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this. But, in a larger sense, we cannot dedicate, we cannot consecrate, we cannot hallow this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it far above our power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember, what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us, the living, rather to be dedicated here to the unfinished work that they have thus far so nobly carried on. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us—that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to the cause for which they here gave the last full measure of devotion—that we here highly resolve that the dead shall not have died in vain—that the nation shall, under God, have a new birth of freedom, and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth."

A mile across the valley the Lutheran Seminary is seen, the most conspicuous landmark of the Confederate line. To the southeast from the cemetery is Culp's Hill, strewn with rocks and boulders and covered with trees. The Emmettsburg road goes southward down the valley, gradually diverging from the Union line, and crossing the fields that were the battleground on the second and third days. It is bordered by numerous monuments, some of great merit, and leads to the "Peach Orchard," where the line bends sharply back. Peach trees are replanted here as the old ones fall. The "Wheat Field" is alongside, now grass-grown. Beyond it the surface goes down among the crags and broken stones of the "Devil's Den," a ravine through which flows a stream, coming from the orchard and wheat field, and separating them from the rocky "Round Tops," the sandstone cliffs of the "Little Round Top" rising high above the ravine. The fields sloping to the stream above the Den are known as the "Valley of Death." Among these rocks there are many monuments, made of the boulders that are so numerous. A toilsome path mounts the "Big Round Top" beyond, and an Observatory on the summit gives a good view over almost the entire battlefield. This summit, more than three miles south of Gettysburg, has tall timber, preserved as it was in the battle. There are cannon surmounting the "Round Tops," representing the batteries in action. Across the valley to the west is the long fringe of timber that masked the Confederate position on Seminary Ridge. A picnic-ground, with access by railway, is located alongside the "Round Tops." The lines of breastworks are maintained, and upon the lower ground, not far away, are preserved the rough stone walls, and to the northward is the little umbrella-shaped grove of trees at which Pickett's charge was directed. The Twentieth Massachusetts regiment brought here a huge conglomerate boulder from New England and set it up as their monument, their Colonel, Paul Revere, being killed in the battle.

There was no fighting along the Confederate line on Seminary Ridge until the scene of the first day's conflict is reached, to the northwest of Gettysburg. Here is marked where General Reynolds fell, just within a grove of trees, and a fine equestrian statue of him has been erected on the field. From his untimely death, Reynolds is regarded as the special Union hero of the battle, as Armistead was the Southern. Nearby a spirited statue, the "Massachusetts Color-Bearer," holds aloft the flag of the Thirteenth Massachusetts regiment, standing upon a slope, thus marking the spot where he fell at the opening of the conflict. Such is the broad and impressive scene of one of the leading battles of the world, and the greatest ever fought in America. But happily the passions which caused it have been stilled, and the combatants are now again united in their patriotic devotion to a common country. As Longfellow solemnly sounds his invocation in the Building of the Ship, so now do all the people in the reunited Union:

"Thus too, sail on, O Ship of State!

Sail on, O Union, strong and great!

Humanity with all its fears,

With all the hopes of future years,

Is hanging breathless on thy fate!"