In Appomattox Court House, Virginia, Confederate General Robert E. Lee surrenders his 28,000 troops to Union General Ulysses S. Grant, effectively ending the American Civil War. Forced to abandon the Confederate capital of Richmond, blocked from joining the surviving Confederate force in North Carolina, and harassed constantly by Union cavalry, Lee had no other option.
In retreating from the Union army’s Appomattox Campaign, the Army of Northern Virginia had stumbled through the Virginia countryside stripped of food and supplies. At one point, Union cavalry forces under General Philip Sheridan had actually outrun Lee’s army, blocking their retreat and taking 6,000 prisoners at Sayler’s Creek. Desertions were mounting daily, and by April 8 the Confederates were surrounded with no possibility of escape. On April 9, Lee sent a message to Grant announcing his willingness to surrender. The two generals met in the parlor of the Wilmer McLean home at one o’clock in the afternoon.
Lee and Grant, both holding the highest rank in their respective armies, had known each other slightly during the Mexican War and exchanged awkward personal inquiries. Characteristically, Grant arrived in his muddy field uniform while Lee had turned out in full dress attire, complete with sash and sword. Lee asked for the terms, and Grant hurriedly wrote them out. All officers and men were to be pardoned, and they would be sent home with their private property–most important, the horses, which could be used for a late spring planting. Officers would keep their side arms, and Lee’s starving men would be given Union rations.
Shushing a band that had begun to play in celebration, General Grant told his officers, “The war is over. The Rebels are our countrymen again.” Although scattered resistance continued for several weeks, for all practical purposes the Civil War had come to an end.
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” Finally, the men of Company D, 30th North Carolina Regiment, fired the last shots on federal forces at Appomattox on 9 Apr. 1865, the day Gen. Robert E. Lee surrendered his Army of Northern Virginia to Union general Ulysses S. Grant.”
My Great-Grandfather was in Company F, of the 30th NC. He was twenty-one years old when this event happened. He fought in the sunken road at Sharpsburg or Antietam as the Yankees call it, Malvern Hill, Gaines Mill, Gettysburg, Front brigade on Stonewall’s flank attack at Chancellorsville, was captured and exchanged at Mine Run, and pardoned at Appromattox. Must a been quite a life for an orphan boy with no slaves.
The 3oth was basically from Edgecombe County, NC.
Also of note is that Henry Lawson of Tarboro, Edgecombe Co., NC was the first Confederate soldier killed in a land battle, Bethel, Va. June 10, 1861
Saddest day in American history.
I Sang Dixie,
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With America currently under control of a hostile alien elite that loathes the Western tradition of chivalry, there may not be losers of the next civil war who make it out alive.