March 25, 1865
We may indeed call
this a many-sided field-day: a breakfast with a pleasure party, an assault and
a recapture of an entrenched line, a review by the President of a division of
infantry, and sharp fighting at sundry points of a front of eighteen miles! If
that is not a mixed affair, I would like to know what is? It has been a lucky
day, for us; and the 9th Corps, after patient waiting for eight months, have
played the game of the “Mine” against their antagonists. The official
despatches will give you the main facts very well, but I can add some
particulars. About daylight, the enemy having massed three divisions and a part
of a fourth, made a sudden rush and carried Fort Stedman and about half a mile
of line commanded by it. The garrisons of the forts on either side stood firm,
however, and repelled a severe attack with much injury to the enemy. Meantime,
General Parke had ordered that the works should be retaken, if it cost every
man in the Corps; and all the scattered regiments immediately at hand were put
in and checked a further advance, until General Hartranft (I'm not sure about
the spelling of his name) brought up the 3d division, which had been
camped in reserve. He personally led in one brigade of it, with conspicuous
gallantry, retook the whole portion lost, and captured, at one swoop, 1800
Rebels. It was just the “Mine,” turned the other way: they got caught in there
and could not get out. Their loss also in killed and wounded must have been
severe, not only from musketry, but also from canister, which was thrown into a
ravine by which they retreated. Upwards of a hundred Rebel dead lay in and
round Fort Stedman alone. Our own losses in the 9th Corps will be somewhat over
800, half of whom may be reckoned prisoners, taken in the first surprise. I
should guess the loss of their opponents as not less than 2600.
SOURCE: George R. Agassiz, Editor, Meade’s
Headquarters, 1863-1865: Letters of Colonel Theodore Lyman from the Wilderness
to Appomattox, p. 322-3
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