Appomattox Court House National Historical Park, Virginia - April 22, 2021 by UGArdener

The Battle of Appomattox Court House, fought in Appomattox County, Virginia, on the morning of April 9, 1865, was one of the last battles of the American Civil War (1861–1865). It was the final engagement of Confederate General in Chief, Robert E. Lee, and his Army of Northern Virginia before it surrendered to the Union Army of the Potomac under the Commanding General of the United States, Ulysses S. Grant. Lee, having abandoned the Confederate capital of Richmond, Virginia, after the nine-and-a-half-month Siege of Petersburg and Richmond, retreated west, hoping to join his army with the remaining Confederate forces in North Carolina, the Army of Tennessee under Gen. Joseph E. Johnston. Union infantry and cavalry forces under Gen. Philip Sheridan pursued and cut off the Confederates' retreat at the central Virginia village of Appomattox Court House. Lee launched a last-ditch attack to break through the Union forces to his front, assuming the Union force consisted entirely of lightly armed cavalry. When he realized that the cavalry was now backed up by two corps of federal infantry, he had no choice but to surrender with his further avenue of retreat and escape now cut off. The signing of the surrender documents occurred in the parlor of the house owned by Wilmer McLean on the afternoon of April 9. On April 12, a formal ceremony of parade and the stacking of arms led by Confederate Maj. Gen. John B. Gordon to federal Brig. Gen. Joshua Chamberlain marked the disbandment of the Army of Northern Virginia with the parole of its nearly 28,000 remaining officers and men, free to return home without their major weapons but enabling men to take their horses and officers to retain their sidearms (swords and pistols), and effectively ending the war in Virginia. This event triggered a series of subsequent surrenders across the South, in North Carolina, Alabama and finally Shreveport, Louisiana, for the Trans-Mississippi Theater in the West by June, signaling the end of the four-year-long war. <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Appomattox_Court_House" rel="noreferrer nofollow">en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Appomattox_Court_House</a> <a href="https://www.nps.gov/apco/index.htm" rel="noreferrer nofollow">www.nps.gov/apco/index.htm</a> From April 2nd and the Fall of Petersburg to April 9th and the surrender of the Army of Northern Virginia at Appomattox Court House, Confederate and Federal armies engaged in skirmishes and battles, including a major battle at Sailor’s Creek. The Confederates were desperate to get to Lynchburg for supplies and to break out to join Confederate forces in North Carolina. The Federals sought peace as Lincoln envisioned it, starting with the destruction or surrender of the Army of Northern Virginia. The armies confronted each other on the gently rolling terrain in and around Appomattox Court House at dawn on April 9th. Confederates of the Secord Corps, under the leadership of Major General John B. Gordon, swept forward across the ridgelines to clash with the Federal cavalry of Major General Philip Sheridan. Initial assaults were successful, but Federal infantry from Major General Charles Griffin’s Fifth Corps and Major General John Gibbon’s Twenty Fourth Corps arrived after a forced march. These men, including some 5,000 United States Colored Troops, blocked Lee’s army from accessing roads to Lynchburg and Danville. Confederates under the command of Lieutenant General James Longstreet could not provide support for Gordon because the Federal Second Corps of Major General Andrew A. Humphreys advanced against Longstreet’s troops. Grant, in a letter from April 7, had asked Lee to accept the “hopelessness of further resistance.” With his army surrounded, Lee now agreed with Grant’s assessment and ordered his officers to offer a white flag of truce. Lee and Grant exchanged letters regarding the surrender of the Army of Northern Virginia. Grant’s terms, reflecting Lincoln’s Second Inaugural Address and Lincoln’s recent guidance provided at City Point, Virginia, required a promise to surrender arms and not engage in further conflicts against the United States. Grant did not ask for unconditional surrender. Lee accepted the terms. Sergeant Major William McCoslin, serving in the 29th Regiment USCI, declared in a May 1865 letter that “We the colored soldiers, have fairly won our rights by loyalty and bravery”. In contrast, Brigadier General Armistead Lindsay Long from the Army of Northern Virginia communicated that “It is impossible to describe the anguish of the troops when it was known that the surrender of the army was inevitable. Of all their trials, this was the greatest and hardest to endure”. On April 9, Colonel Elisha Hunt Rhodes, who served as part of the 2nd Rhode Island Infantry, chronicled that the “Rebels are half starved, and our men have divided their rations with them . . . . We did it cheerfully”. Brevet Major General Joshua Chamberlain stated that “Brave men may become good friends,” but Chamberlain further reported that a Confederate officer was more uncertain: “You’re mistaken, sir . . . . You may forgive us but we won’t be forgiven. There is rancor in our hearts . . . which you little dream of”. On the evening of April 9, Pvt. Hiram W. Harding, who served in the 9th Virginia Cavalry Company D, described this poignant occasion in his diary: the “noble army of Northern Virginia was surrendered to day at ten O'clock &amp; the Cavalry ordered to Buckingham courthouse there to be disbanded”. Federal officials printed parole passes for Confederate soldiers beginning on April 10th from the Clover Hill Tavern; the formal ceremony of the stacking of arms took place April 12th. The American myth of Appomattox, Grant, and Lee and their individual and nuanced symbolism sparked simultaneously with the surrender. Written by Russ Wood, Appomattox Court House NHP Volunteer .....