Spotsylvania Court House: The Mule Shoe and Heth’s Salient

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, …