Battle of Seven Pines - Battle

Battle

The attack got off to a bad start on May 31 when Longstreet marched down the Charles City Road and turned onto the Williamsburg Road instead of the Nine Mile Road. Huger's orders had not specified a time that the attack was scheduled to start and he was not awakened until he heard a division marching nearby. Johnston and his second-in-command, Smith, unaware of Longstreet's location or Huger's delay, waited at their headquarters for word of the start of the battle. Five hours after the scheduled start, at 1 p.m., D.H. Hill became impatient and sent his brigades forward against Casey's division.

Casey's line, manned by inexperienced troops, buckled with some men retreating, but fought fiercely for possession of their earthworks, resulting in heavy casualties on both sides. The Confederates only engaged four brigades of the thirteen on their right flank that day, so they did not hit with the power that they could have concentrated on this weak point in the Union line. Casey sent for reinforcements but Keyes was slow in responding. Eventually the mass of Confederates broke through, seized a Union redoubt, and Casey's men retreated to the second line of defensive works at Seven Pines. During this period, both of the high commanders were unaware of the severity of the battle. As late as 2:30 p.m., Heintzelman reported to McClellan, still sick in bed, that he had received no word from Keyes. Johnston was only 2½ miles from the front, but an acoustic shadow prevented him from hearing the sounds of cannons and musketry and he and his staff did not know the battle had begun until 4 p.m.

The Army of the Potomac was accompanied by the Union Army Balloon Corps commanded by Prof. Thaddeus S. C. Lowe, who had established two balloon camps on the north side of the river, one at Gaines's Farm and one at Mechanicsville. Lowe reported on May 29 the buildup of Confederate forces to the left of New Bridge or in front of the Fair Oaks train station. With constant rain on May 30 and heavy winds the morning of May 31, the aerostats Washington and Intrepid did not launch until noon. Lowe observed Confederate troops moving in battle formation and this information was relayed verbally to McClellan's headquarters by 2 p.m. Lowe continued to send reports from the Intrepid via telegraph the remainder of May 31. On June 1, Lowe reported that the Confederate barracks to the left of Richmond as being free from smoke. McClellan did not follow up on this information with a counterattack by his corps north of the Chickahominy River.

Around 4:40 p.m., Hill, now strengthened by reinforcements from Longstreet, hit the secondary Union line near Seven Pines, which was manned by the remnants of Casey's division, the IV Corps division of Brig. Gen. Darius N. Couch, and Brig. Gen. Philip Kearny's division from Heintzelman's III Corps. Hill organized a flanking maneuver, sending four regiments under Colonel Micah Jenkins from Longstreet's command to attack Keyes's right flank. The attack collapsed the Federal line back to the Williamsburg Road, a mile and a half beyond Seven Pines. The fighting in that part of the line died out by 7:30 p.m.

Just before Hill's attack began, Johnston received a note from Longstreet requesting that he join the battle, the first news he had heard of the fighting. Johnston went forward on the Nine Mile Road with three brigades of Whiting's division and encountered stiff resistance near Fair Oaks Station, the right flank of Keyes's line. Soon heavy Union reinforcements arrived. Brig. Gen. Edwin C. Sumner, II Corps commander, heard the sounds of battle from his position north of the river. On his own initiative, he dispatched a division under Brig. Gen. John Sedgwick over the sole remaining bridge. The treacherous "Grapevine Bridge" was near collapse from the swollen river, but the weight of the crossing troops helped to hold it steady against the rushing water. When told that the river could not be crossed, Sumner replied "Impossible!? Sir, I tell you I can cross! I am ordered!" After the last man had crossed safely, the bridge collapsed and was swept away. Sedgwick's men provided the key to resisting Whiting's attack. The fighting was costly as Whiting lost three of four brigade commanders. Brig. Gen. Wade Hampton went down wounded, Robert H. Hatton was killed, and J. Johnston Pettigrew was wounded and captured. On the Union side, Brig. Gen. Oliver O. Howard had his right arm shattered by a Minié ball. The arm was amputated, and he would not return to action for several months.

The most historically significant incident of the day occurred around dusk, when Johnston was struck in the right shoulder by a bullet, immediately followed by a shell fragment hitting him in the chest. He fell unconscious from his horse with a broken right shoulder blade and two broken ribs and was evacuated to Richmond. G.W. Smith assumed temporary command of the army. Smith, plagued with ill health, was indecisive about the next steps for the battle and made a bad impression on Confederate President Jefferson Davis and General Robert E. Lee, Davis's military adviser. After the end of fighting the following day, Davis replaced Smith with Lee as commander of the Army of Northern Virginia.

On June 1, the Confederates renewed their assaults against the Federals, who had brought up more reinforcements and fought from strong positions, but made little headway. Brig. Gen. Israel B. Richardson's division of the II Corps had arrived, along with two brigades from Brig. Gen. Joseph Hooker's division of the III Corps (the third under Brig. Gen Cuvier Grover was left behind to guard the bridges at White Oak Swamp). They engaged Huger's and Longstreet's divisions, whose lines finally broke under the attacks. The fighting ended about 11:30 a.m. when the Confederates withdrew. McClellan arrived on the battlefield from his sick bed at about this time, but the Union Army did not counterattack.