Battle of Cold Harbor: Difference between revisions

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The '''Battle of Cold Harbor''', the final battle of [[Union army | Union]] Lieut. Gen. [[Ulysses S. Grant]]'s 1864 [[Overland Campaign]] during the [[American Civil War]], today lives in infamy as one of history's most lopsided battles. Grant said of the battle in his memoirs "I have always regretted that the last assault at Cold Harbor was ever made. I might say the same thing of the assault of the 22d of May, 1863, at [[Battle of Vicksburg|Vicksburg]]. At Cold Harbor no advantage whatever was gained to compensate for the heavy loss we sustained."

==Location==

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The battle began on [[May 31]], [[1864]], when [[Union Army|Union]] [[cavalry]] under Maj. Gen. [[Philip H. Sheridan]] occupied the crucial crossroads of Old Cold Harbor, 10 [[mile]]s (16 [[kilometre|km]]) from the [[Confederate States of America|Confederate]] capital of [[Richmond, Virginia|Richmond]]. By outflanking Lee's army three separate times, including twice after battles that were actually Confederate tactical victories, they stood at the gates of Richmond. Grant hoped that one more attack might finally break the outnumbered [[Army of Northern Virginia]] commanded by Gen. [[Robert E. Lee]]

Over the next two days, the armies of Lee and Grant, having disengaged from a standoff at the [[Battle of North Anna | North Anna River]] 10 miles (16 km) to the north, took up new positions around Cold Harbor. Grant, having received heavy reinforcement, brought 105,000 men (the bulk of the [[Army of the Potomac]]) onto the field. Lee had also managed to replace many of his 20,000 casualties to that point in the campaign, and his army numbered 59,000. But the disparity in numbers was no longer what it had been—Grant's reinforcements were often raw recruits and heavy artillery troops (pulled from the defenses of [[Washington, D.C.]]) unfamiliar with infantry tactics, while most of Lee's had been veterans moved from inactive fronts, and they were strongly [[trench warfare|entrenched]] in [[fortification]]s.

Grant, unaware of the strength of the Confederate [[earthworks (engineering)|earthworks]] that confronted his army, directed [[George G. Meade]] to mount an assault. Meade and his corps commanders failed to conduct any meaningful reconnaissance of the enemy position. Many of the soldiers were apprehensive about this assault and there are anecdotes that some pinned notes inside their uniforms, meant to identify their bodies after their presumed deaths.

===The Assault===

On the morning of [[June 3]], Meade's assault on the Confederate right flank was conducted by three corps, totaling 31,000 men: the [[II Corps (ACW)|II Corps]] ([[Winfield S. Hancock]]), [[VI Corps (ACW)|VI Corps]] ([[Horatio G. Wright]]), and [[XVIII Corps (ACW)|XVIII Corps]] ([[William Farrar Smith | William F. "Baldy" Smith]], part of [[Benjamin Franklin Butler (politician)|Benjamin Butler]]'s then-separate [[Army of the James]]). The defenders, consisting mostly of men from the Confederate First and Third Corps, who fought from behind earthworks, slaughtered them as soon as they moved forward. One Confederate soldier was quoted after the battle as saying it was "simply murder". The Confederate [[musket]] and [[artillery]] fire along the XVIII Corps front was so severe that its men were actually pinned to the ground for protection, unable even to retire to their own lines. Union forces lost 7,000 men in about 90 minutes, the Confederates fewer than 1,500. Grant called off the attacks at midday after visiting his corps commanders. Meade inexplicably bragged to his wife the next day that he was in command for the assault.

Before the assault, the Union soldiers had been in no doubt as to what they were up against. Many were seen writing their names on papers that they pinned inside their uniforms, so their bodies could be identified. One blood-spattered diary from a Union soldier found after the battle included a final entry: "June 3, 1864. Cold Harbor. I was killed."

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==Results and Aftermath==

The Battle of Cold Harbor was the final victory won by Lee's army (part of his forces won the [[Battle of the Crater]] the following month, during the [[Siege of Petersburg]], but this did not represent a general engagement between the armies), and its most decisive in terms of casualties. The [[Union Army|Union army]], in bravely attempting the futile assault, lost 10–13,000 men over twelve days. The battle brought the toll in Union casualties since the beginning of May to a total of more than 52,000, compared to 33,000 for Lee. Although the cost was horrible, Grant's larger army finished the campaign with lower relative casualties than Lee.

Estimates vary as to the casualties at Cold Harbor. The following table summarizes estimates from a variety of popular sources: