US civil war battles in 1862
The Seven Days Battles were a series of seven battles over seven days from June 25 to July 1, 1862, near Richmond, Virginia, during the American Civil War. Confederate General Robert E. Lee drove the invading Union Army of the Potomac, commanded by Maj. Gen. George B. McClellan, away from Richmond and into a retreat down the Virginia Peninsula. The series of battles is sometimes known erroneously as the Seven Days Campaign, but it was actually the culmination of the Peninsula Campaign, not a separate campaign in its own right.
The Seven Days began on Wednesday, June 25, 1862, with a Union attack in the minor Battle of Oak Grove, but McClellan quickly lost the initiative as Lee began a series of attacks at Beaver Dam Creek (Mechanicsville) on June 26, Gaines's Mill on June 27, the minor actions at Garnett's and Golding's Farm on June 27 and 28, and the attack on the Union rear guard at Savage's Station on June 29. McClellan's Army of the Potomac continued its retreat toward the safety of Harrison's Landing on the James River. Lee's final opportunity to intercept the Union Army was at the Battle of Glendale on June 30, but poorly executed orders and the delay of Stonewall Jackson's troops allowed his enemy to escape to a strong defensive position on Malvern Hill. At the Battle of Malvern Hill on July 1, Lee launched futile frontal assaults and suffered heavy casualties in the face of strong infantry and artillery defenses.
The Seven Days ended with McClellan's army in relative safety next to the James River, having suffered almost 16,000 casualties during the retreat. Lee's army, which had been on the offensive during the Seven Days, lost over 20,000. As Lee became convinced that McClellan would not resume his threat against Richmond, he moved north for the northern Virginia campaign and the Maryland campaign.
Background.
The Peninsula campaign.
The Peninsula campaign was the unsuccessful attempt by McClellan to capture the Confederate capital of Richmond and end the war. It started in March 1862, when McClellan landed his army at Fort Monroe and moved northwest, up the Virginia Peninsula beginning in early April. Confederate Brig. Gen. John B. Magruder's defensive position on the Warwick Line caught McClellan by surprise. His hopes for a quick advance foiled, McClellan ordered his army to prepare for a siege of Yorktown. Just before the siege preparations were completed, the Confederates, now under the direct command of Johnston, began a withdrawal toward Richmond.
The first heavy fighting of the campaign occurred in the Battle of Williamsburg (May 5), in which the Union troops managed some tactical victories, but the Confederates continued their withdrawal. An amphibious flanking movement to Eltham's Landing (May 7) was ineffective in cutting off the Confederate retreat. In the Battle of Drewry's Bluff (May 15), an attempt by the United States Navy to reach Richmond by way of the James River was repulsed.
As McClellan's army reached the outskirts of Richmond, a minor battle occurred at Hanover Court House (May 27), but it was followed by a surprise attack by Johnston at the Battle of Seven Pines or Fair Oaks on May 31 and June 1. The battle was inconclusive, with heavy casualties, but it had lasting effects on the campaign. Johnston was wounded and replaced on June 1 by the more aggressive Robert E. Lee. Lee spent almost a month extending his defensive lines and organizing his Army of Northern Virginia; McClellan accommodated this by sitting passively to his front, waiting for dry weather and roads, until the start of the Seven Days. Lee, who had developed a reputation for caution early in the war, knew he had no numerical superiority over McClellan, but he planned an offensive campaign that was the first indication of the aggressive nature he would display for the remainder of the war.
Planning for offensives.
Lee's initial attack plan, similar to Johnston's plan at Seven Pines, was complex and required expert coordination and execution by all of his subordinates, but Lee knew that he could not win in a battle of attrition or siege against the Union Army. It was developed at a meeting on June 23. The Union Army straddled the rain-swollen Chickahominy River, with the bulk of the army, four corps, arrayed in a semicircular line south of the river. The remainder, the V Corps under Brig. Gen. Fitz John Porter, was north of the river near Mechanicsville in an L-shaped line facing north–south behind Beaver Dam Creek and southeast along the Chickahominy. Lee's plan was to cross the Chickahominy with the bulk of his army to attack the Union north flank, leaving only two divisions (under Maj. Gens. Benjamin Huger and John B. Magruder) to hold a line of entrenchments against McClellan's superior strength. This would concentrate about 65,500 troops to oppose 30,000, leaving only 25,000 to protect Richmond and to contain the other 60,000 men of the Union Army. The Confederate cavalry under Brig. Gen. J.E.B. Stuart had reconnoitered Porter's right flank—as part of a daring but militarily dubious circumnavigation of the entire Union Army from June 12 to 15—and found it vulnerable.
Lee intended for Jackson to attack Porter's right flank early on the morning of June 26, and A.P. Hill would move from Meadow Bridge to Beaver Dam Creek, which flows into the Chickahominy, advancing on the Federal trenches. (Lee hoped that Porter would evacuate his trenches under pressure, obviating the need for a direct frontal assault.) Following this, Longstreet and D.H. Hill would pass through Mechanicsville and join the battle. Huger and Magruder would provide diversions on their fronts to distract McClellan as to Lee's real intentions. Lee hoped that Porter would be overwhelmed from two sides by the mass of 65,000 men, and the two leading Confederate divisions would move on Cold Harbor and cut McClellan's communications with White House Landing.
McClellan also planned an offensive. He had received intelligence that Lee was prepared to move and that the arrival of Maj. Gen. Thomas J. "Stonewall" Jackson's force from the Shenandoah Valley was imminent (McClellan was aware of Jackson's presence at Ashland Station, but did nothing to reinforce Porter's vulnerable corps north of the river). He decided to resume the offensive before Lee could. Anticipating Jackson's reinforcements marching from the north, he increased cavalry patrols on likely avenues of approach. He wanted to advance his siege artillery about a mile and a half closer to the city by taking the high ground on Nine Mile Road around Old Tavern. In preparation for that, he planned an attack on Oak Grove, south of Old Tavern and the Richmond and York River Railroad, which would position his men to attack Old Tavern from two directions.
Opposing forces.
The armies that fought in the Seven Days Battles comprised almost 200,000 men, which offered the potential for the largest battles of the war. However, the inexperience or caution of the generals involved usually prevented the appropriate concentration of forces and mass necessary for decisive tactical victories.
The Confederate army was not a proper unified command as the Army of the Potomac was, but simply a thrown-together collection of all the troops that could be gathered for the defense of Richmond. This contributed to the poor coordination of the army during the battles and the inability of Robert E. Lee to destroy the Union army.
The average strength of a division in the Army of the Potomac was about 9000 men (including non-combatants) with Casey's division being the smallest at around 7000 and Morell's being the largest at 11,000 men. The average strength of Confederate divisions varied from 12,000 men (A.P. Hill's division) to 5000 men (Theophilus Holmes's division). Confederate reports listed only combat troops and excluded non-combatants such as couriers, staff officers, and wagon drivers. Jackson's command was severely understrength from the Valley campaign and his own division had less than 2000 men, most of them being in the Stonewall Brigade while the brigades of Samuel Fulkerson and John R. Jones were down to nearly regimental size and were held in reserve for most of the Seven Days Battles. Ewell's three brigades numbered 3000 men total. Jackson was reinforced with the brigade of Alexander Lawton, recently arrived from Georgia, and numbering 3500 men. This brought his total strength to around 8000 men.
D.H. Hill's division numbered around 7700 men, having numbered close to 10,000 before the heavy losses at Seven Pines. They were reinforced with Roswell Ripley's brigade, newly arrived from North Carolina, and numbering 2300 men, bringing the total strength of Hill's command to 10,000 men. James Longstreet's division numbered 9050 men on June 25 according to army ordnance chief Edward P. Alexander. It had numbered close to 12,000 men prior to losses at Seven Pines. Benjamin Huger's division numbered approximately 8600 men. William Whiting had around 4000 men in his two brigades. John Magruder's three divisions numbered about 13,000 men.
Union.
McClellan's Army of the Potomac, with approximately 105,000 men, was organized largely as it had been at Seven Pines.
Confederate.
Lee's Army of Northern Virginia was larger than the one he inherited from Johnston, and, at about 92,000 men, the largest Confederate army assembled during the war.
Battles.
Oak Grove.
McClellan planned to advance to the west, along the axis of the Williamsburg Road, in the direction of Richmond. Between the two armies was a small, dense forest, wide, bisected by the headwaters of White Oak Swamp. Two divisions of the III Corps were selected for the assault, commanded by Brig. Gens. Joseph Hooker and Philip Kearny. Facing them was the division of Confederate Maj. Gen. Benjamin Huger.
Soon after 8 a.m., June 25, the Union brigades of Brig. Gens. Daniel E. Sickles (the Excelsior Brigade), Cuvier Grover, both of Hooker's division, and John C. Robinson stepped off. Although Robinson and Grover made good progress on the left and in the center, Sickles's New Yorkers encountered difficulties moving through their abatis, then through the upper portions of the creek, and finally met stiff Confederate resistance, all of which threw the Federal line out of alignment. Huger took advantage of the confusion by launching a counterattack with the brigade of Brig. Gen. Ambrose R. Wright against Grover's brigade. At a crucial moment in the battle, the 26th North Carolina of Brig. Gen. Robert Ransom's brigade, in their first combat engagement, delivered a perfectly synchronized volley of rifle fire against Sickles's brigade, breaking up its delayed attack and sending the 71st New York into a panicked retreat, which Sickles described as "disgraceful confusion."
Heintzelman ordered reinforcements sent forward and also notified army commander McClellan, who was attempting to manage the battle by telegraph from away. McClellan ordered his men to withdraw back to their entrenchments, mystifying his subordinates on the scene. Arriving at the front at 1 p.m., seeing that the situation was not as bad as he had feared, McClellan ordered his men forward to retake the ground for which they had already fought once that day. The fighting lasted until nightfall.
The minor battle was McClellan's only tactical offensive action against Richmond. His attack gained only at a cost of over 1,000 casualties on both sides and was not strong enough to derail the offensive planned by Robert E. Lee, which had already been set in motion.
Beaver Dam Creek (Mechanicsville).
Lee's plan called for Jackson to begin the attack on Porter's north flank early on June 26. A.P. Hill's Light Division was to advance from Meadow Bridge when he heard Jackson's guns, clear the Union pickets from Mechanicsville, and then move to Beaver Dam Creek. D.H. Hill and Longstreet were to pass through Mechanicsville and support Jackson and A.P. Hill. South of the river, Magruder and Huger were to demonstrate to deceive the four Union corps on their front.
Lee's intricate plan went awry immediately. Jackson's men, fatigued from their recent campaign and lengthy march, ran at least four hours behind schedule. By 3 p.m., A.P. Hill grew impatient and began his attack without orders, a frontal assault with 11,000 men. Porter extended and strengthened his right flank and fell back to concentrate along Beaver Dam Creek and Ellerson's Mill. There, 14,000 well entrenched soldiers, aided by 32 guns in six batteries, repulsed repeated Confederate attacks with substantial casualties.
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This was the first of four occasions within the next seven days when Jackson would fail to display initiative, resourcefulness, or