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The Overland Campaign, also known as Grant's Overland Campaign and the Wilderness Campaign, was a series of battles fought in Virginia during May and June 1864, towards the end of the American Civil War.
The Battle of the Wilderness was fought on May 5–7, 1864, during the American Civil War.It was the first battle of Lieutenant General Ulysses S. Grant's 1864 Virginia Overland Campaign against General Robert E. Lee and the Confederate Army of Northern Virginia.
Throughout the Civil War, Grant's armies incurred approximately 154,000 casualties, while having inflicted 191,000 casualties on his opposing Confederate armies. [3] In terms of success, Grant was the only general during the Civil War who received the surrender of three Confederate armies. [2]
Lee was not certain of Grant's specific plans, however; if Grant was not intending to cross the Pamunkey in force at Hanovertown, the Union army could outflank him and head directly to Richmond. Lee ordered cavalry under Maj. Gen. Wade Hampton to make a reconnaissance in force, break through the Union cavalry screen, and find the Union infantry.
A Memoir of the Last Year of the War for Independence in the Confederate States of America. Edited by Gary W. Gallagher. Columbia: University of South Carolina Press, 2001. ISBN 1-57003-450-8. Gallagher, Gary W., ed. The Shenandoah Valley Campaign of 1864. Military Campaigns of the Civil War. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2006.
On May 12, Grant attempted to break through Lee's Muleshoe salient guarded by Confederate artillery, resulting in one of the bloodiest assaults of the Civil War, known as the Bloody Angle. [195] Unable to break Lee's lines, Grant again flanked the rebels to the southeast, meeting at North Anna, where a battle lasted three days. [196]
Following the bloody Union repulse at the Battle of Cold Harbor on June 3, Grant decided on a new strategy. Since May 4, his Overland Campaign had consisted of major battles against Robert E. Lee, each of which (the Wilderness, Spotsylvania Court House, North Anna, Totopotomoy Creek, and Cold Harbor) was followed by a period of stalemate and then a maneuver around Lee's right flank in an ...
The final campaign for Richmond, Virginia, the capital of the Confederate States, began when the Union Army of the Potomac crossed the James River in June 1864. The armies under the command of Lieutenant General and General in Chief Ulysses S. Grant (1822–1885) laid siege to Petersburg, south of Richmond, intending to cut the two cities' supply lines and force the Confederates to evacuate.