A historical marker along modern Rt. 208 marks the area where Confederates broke through the Federal supply line on Fredericksburg Road.
from Chris
The main action on Spotsylvania’s eastern front opened on May 9 during the battle of the Ny River. Ten days later, in a fight that brought the battle full circle, the last major action of the battle also happened on the eastern front—or, more accurately, in the rear, rather than the front.
Robert E. Lee, discontent to …
from Chris
At daylight on May 18, Gourverneur K. Warren ordered a cannonade all along his line. Twenty-six guns came to bear in a thundering roar.
The “whole army having moved off to our right to make an assault on the enemy,” he wrote, he opened the artillery bombardment in support of the assault. It was also intended to discourage Confederates from making a counter-attack of their own along his line, which was now stretched thin to cover the works …
From Chris
“We have had five days’ almost constant rain without any prospect yet of its clearing up,” Ulysses S. Grant told Washington on May 16. “The roads have now become so impassable that ambulances with wounded can no long run between here and Fredericksburg. All offensive operations necessarily cease until we can have twenty-four hours of dry weather.”
During the waiting game, the army nonetheless found ways to stay busy. “”[T]he army was employed in constant reconnoitering and skirmishing, …
from Chris
The rain that began on May 11 continued without letup for days. By May 15, Spotsylvania was well soggy. Grant continued to probe for an opening to get at Lee, but with the Federal cavalry away on a raid toward Richmond, Grant was left without his eyes and ears. As a result, his infantry had to grope blindly, hampering effective movement, made even more difficult by the foul weather.
Lee, too, sought information. He sent a division of …
May 13, 1864, was a rainy day on the battlefield.
from Chris
The morning of May 13 saw carnage across the Spotsylvania battlefield unlike anything the armies had before seen. Once the fighting at the Mule Shoe settled down and Lee settled into his new fall-back position, Union forces took stock of their situation. The cries and moans of the injured drifted across the muddy landscape and through the devastated forests. Otherwise, fighting quieted all along the line.
During the …
Historian Gordon Rhea at Heth’s Salient during the 2019 CVBT Annual Conference
from Chris
May 12 would see some of the worst fighting of the Overland Campaign—some would say of even the entire war.
Federals launched an attack against the tip of a horse-shoe shaped portion of the Confederate line that has since become known as the Mule Shoe Salient. For 22 consecutive hours, the armies locked in combat, much of it hand-to-hand, in the pouring rain. In some places, …
from Chris
On May 11, 1864, a pall of disappointment and discouragement sat over what is now Stevenson Ridge.
First, the death of Brig. Gen. Stevenson on the previous day had knocked the wind out of the IX Corps’s sails. Then, a late-afternoon push into Spotsylvania Court House ended in an inexplicable withdrawal. The corps had made gains that put the army as close to the village as it would ever get during the two-week battle, but army commander Ulysses …
from Chris
Jennifer put together some lovely centerpieces for my daughter’s wedding a couple weeks ago: floating candles in glass vases wrapped in bands of silver sparkles, accented by a few small votives in silver holders. She placed everything on a mirror and then sprinkled sparkly silver stones around them. Particularly in the low light of evening, the centerpieces looked elegant and offered the perfect touch of ambience.
Here are some pictures from when we tested them out on the …
from Chris
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from Chris
Last weekend, Stevenson Ridge again had the chance to host Sunday brunch for the Central Virginia Battlefields Trust’s annual conference. After two full days of battlefielding in the Wilderness and at Spotsylvania—plus the Saturday night dinner highlighted by a great talk about recent archeology being done on a Civil War field hospital on the Second Manassas battlefield—festivities wrapped up with a delicious meal and a special tour of CVBT’s newest property acquisition, Myer’s Hill (which is pretty much …