Battle of Gaines's Mill - Battle

Battle

The first actions of the battle occurred between noon and 1 p.m. on June 27 after D.H. Hill's division reached Old Cold Harbor, where it was scheduled to link up with Stonewall Jackson's command. Hill pushed through the crossroads with two brigades, which encountered unexpected infantry fire. Seeking to suppress the fire, he brought forward the Jeff Davis Battery from Alabama, but it was soon outgunned by two six-gun batteries manned by U.S. regulars from Brig. Gen. George Sykes's division. Hill was surprised at the level of resistance and also that he seemed to be meeting the front of the Union force, not the expected flank, so he determined to wait for Jackson's arrival before moving further. The noise from this engagement failed to reach General Lee at his headquarters, the house owned by William Hogan, named "Selwyn".

A.P. Hill's division had moved across Beaver Dam Creek early in the morning, finding the former Union line lightly defended. As they proceeded eastward and approached Gaines's Mill at about the time that D.H. Hill's men were engaged, Porter formally asked McClellan to send Slocum's division across the Chickahominy over Alexander's Bridge to support him. Hill's lead brigade, under Brig. Gen. Maxcy Gregg, was held up by skirmishers from Col. Hiram Berdan's 1st U.S. Sharpshooters and the 9th Massachusetts Infantry. By early afternoon, he ran into strong opposition by Porter, deployed along Boatswain's Creek and the swampy terrain was a major obstacle against the advance. Attacks by the brigades of Brig. Gens. Gregg, Dorsey Pender, Joseph R. Anderson, and Lawrence O'Bryan Branch made little headway. A particularly bloody engagement occurred as the 1st South Carolina Rifles attacked a Massachusetts battery, but were repulsed by Zouaves of the 5th New York, which inflicted 57% casualties (76 killed, 221 wounded, and 58 missing) on the South Carolinians, the greatest Confederate regimental losses of the day.

Instead of pursuing a fleeing enemy, as his orders had directed, A.P. Hill had attacked an entrenched Union position, losing about 2,000 of his 13,200 men in the failed attempt. Combined with his attacks at Mechanicsville the previous day, the Light Division had lost over a quarter of its men. General McClellan was encouraged by the telegrams Porter sent back to his headquarters a few miles to the rear. He replied, "If the enemy are retiring and you are a chasseur, pitch in." He also told Franklin to cross the river over the Duane bridge and attack the enemy's flank if he saw a chance, but he was dismayed to hear that the VI Corps commander had destroyed the bridge for fear of a possible enemy attack. At the same time, Brig. Gen. Edwin V. Sumner of the II Corps reported enemy activity in his front. McClellan's optimism was dashed and he ordered that his headquarters equipment be packed up in preparation for the retreat. On the Confederate side, General Lee had been an active participant in the failed assault, rallying his troops too close to the front for their comfort. As Longstreet arrived to the southwest of A.P. Hill, he saw the difficulty of attacking over such terrain and delayed until Stonewall Jackson could attack on Hill's left.

For the second time in the Seven Days, however, Jackson was late. A guide from the 4th Virginia Cavalry, Pvt. John Henry Timberlake, had misunderstood Jackson's intent and led him down the wrong road. After they counter-marched, losing about an hour, Jackson's troops found the road to Old Cold Harbor obstructed by trees felled by the retreating Union army and were harassed by sharpshooters, delaying their arrival. The first of Jackson's command to reach the battlefield was the division of Maj. Gen. Richard S. Ewell, who was met by Lee's aide, Walter Taylor, and instructed to move into action immediately. Lee was concerned that Porter would counterattack the weakened troops of A.P. Hill, so he ordered Longstreet to conduct a diversionary attack to stabilize the lines until Jackson's full command could arrive and attack from the north. In Longstreet's attack, Brig. Gen. George E. Pickett's brigade attempted a frontal assault and was beaten back under severe fire with heavy losses. Pickett himself was wounded in the shoulder. Confederate President Jefferson Davis was among the party witnessing Pickett's failed attempt.

Ewell began his attack immediately, around 3:30 p.m., without waiting for his entire division to come on line. General Lee's instructions were to advance along the same axis used by the brigades of Gregg and Branch, to maintain the momentum of the attack. He sent in his lead brigade, Louisianans under Col. Isaac Seymour, commanding in Maj. Gen. Richard Taylor's absence for medical reasons. Seymour was relatively inexperienced and his troops became confused in the woods and bogs of Boatswain's Swamp. Their confusion increased when Col. Seymour was killed by a Union rifle volley. Maj. Roberdeau Wheat, the colorful leader of the Louisiana Tigers Battalion, moved to the front to lead the brigade, but he was also killed with a bullet through his head. The Louisiana Brigade withdrew from the battle. Ewell's attack continued with two regiments from the brigade of Brig. Gen. Isaac R. Trimble, but they could not advance beyond the swamp, falling with about 20% casualties. Porter was starting to receive reinforcements from Slocum's division and he brought forward troops to feed into gaps in his line. However, despite telegrams from Porter for more assistance, General McClellan gave no thought to the advantages of a counterattack. He asked his corps commanders south of the river whether they had any troops they could spare. When no one volunteered, he directed Sumner of the II Corps to send two brigades—about one tenth of the army—across the river, but because of the distances involved they would not reach the scene for another three hours.

When Stonewall Jackson finally reached Old Cold Harbor, weary from the marching and counter-marching, he began to arrange his troops and those of D.H. Hill to trap the Federals he expected to be driven east by Longstreet and A.P. Hill. He soon received instructions from General Lee that informed him of the current situation and he began to prepare his command to assault the main Federal line. Faulty staff work prevented his men from moving forward for over an hour. While Jackson rode back and forth distractedly, his chaplain, Maj. Robert L. Dabney, took the initiative to find the divisions of Brig. Gens. William H. C. Whiting and Charles S. Winder and corrected the garbled instructions they had received. Generals Lee and Jackson met on the Telegraph Road to coordinate a final assault across the entire Federal line.

Lee's assault at 7 p.m. was conducted by 16 brigades, about 32,100 men. Porter had about 34,000 men to defend the line, but many of these were worn out from the previous attacks and command cohesion was hampered by feeding isolated reinforcements into the line to fill gaps. Nevertheless, they had the advantages of good defensible terrain and superiority in artillery. The Confederates were not able to advance simultaneously in a neat battle line over the 2.25-mile front, but rushed forward and were repulsed intermittently in smaller unit actions. On the Confederate left, the assault by D.H. Hill's division met heavy resistance from the regulars of Sykes's division around the McGehee house. In the center, the Georgians of Brig. Gen. Alexander R. Lawton's brigade were in their first battle. They pushed forward with the assistance of the Stonewall Brigade of Winder's division, along with Elzey's and Trimble's of Ewell's division. The Confederate right was opposed by the most difficult terrain, a quarter-mile open wheatfield that sloped down to Boatswain's Swamp and then faced two lines of Union defenders on higher ground. James Longstreet wrote in his report, "I was, in fact, in the position from which the enemy wished us to attack him."

As the sun was starting to go down, William Whiting's division achieved the breakthrough on Longstreet's front. Brig. Gen. John Bell Hood's Texas Brigade move forward swiftly and aggressively and broke a hole in the line. Pickett's brigade also succeeded in its second assault of the day. Confederate breakthroughs on their center and right could not be countered and the Union line crumbled. Sykes's regulars conducted an orderly withdrawal from the McGehee house to Grapevine Bridge. The Union brigades of Brig. Gens. Thomas F. Meagher and William H. French arrived from the II Corps, too late to help other than as a rear guard for Porter's retreat. A battalion of the 5th U.S. Cavalry under Captain Charles J. Whiting made a desperate charge against the Texas Brigade, but was forced to surrender after heavy losses. By 4 a.m. on June 28, Porter withdrew across the Chickahominy, burning the bridges behind him.