BGuthrie Photos: VA -- Cold Harbor Natl Battlefield

VA -- Cold Harbor Natl Battlefield:

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Specific picture descriptions: Photos above with "i" icons next to the bracketed sequence numbers (e.g. "[1] ") are described as follows:
1. COLD_150606_036.JPG: 2nd Connecticut Volunteer Heavy Artillery Late on the afternoon of June 1, 1864, Col. Elisha Strong Kellogg and his 2nd Connecticut Volunteer Heavy Artillery attacked Confederate entrenchments to the west along with other Federal troops from the Sixth and the Eighteenth Corps. Kellogg advanced his 1500 men across this ground in three battalions with weapons at port arms. The combined Union attacks resulted in the capture of approximately 300 prisoners. Maj. Gen. Robert F. Hoke's Confederate division halted their further progress with a withering fire delivered from the left flank. Kellogg was killed at the head of the first battalion in front of the abattis and breastworks held by Brig. Gen. Thomas L. Clingman's brigade. The remaining men of the 2nd Connecticut regrouped under Col. Emory Upton, and assisted in the capture of the Confederate line at sunset. However, more than 330 of its men fell killed and wounded in these attacks. May this unit that began the day raw and inexperienced nevermore be known as a "band box" regiment…. Connecticut Remembers Her Fallen Sons
2. COLD_150606_047.JPG: Hot Work at Cold Harbor: During the Federal army's June 1 assault at Cold Harbor, the 2nd Connecticut Heavy Artillery paused briefly in this depression before making its final push toward the Confederate line less than 25 yards in front of you. A New York soldier, from the same brigade as the 2nd Connecticut, described the effect of the Confederate fire on the heavy artillerymen:
  "The rebel fire was very effective and it seemed to us from where we stood that our poor fellows would all get shot. The ground over which they passed was covered with men. We could see them fall in all shapes. Some would fall forward as if they had caught their feet and tripped and fell. Others would stagger about a few paces before they dropped."
3. COLD_150606_054.JPG: We Have Broken Through: This ravine played a critical role in the early stages of fighting at Cold Harbor. On the afternoon of June 1, 1864, Thomas L. Clingman's North Carolinians and William T. Wofford's Georgians, attempting to hold this position, failed to occupy the low swampy ground in the ravine. Union soldiers of the Sixth Corps took advantage of this weakness by attacking along the drainage and piercing the Confederate defenses. Southern reserves quickly rushed forward and drove back the attackers, sealing the break in the line. A new line was then built a short distance to the west.
4. COLD_150606_058.JPG: A Captured Trench: On the morning of June 1, 1864, Confederate soldiers of Thomas Clingman's North Carolina brigade frantically dug this trench. They anticipated a Union assault later in the day. Around 6:00 p.m. Federal troops of the VI Corps moved into position near Old Cold Harbor, a half-mile to the east, and with two hours of daylight remaining, received orders to attack. This would be part of the first Union assault at Cold Harbor. Emory Upton's brigade of 2600 Union infantry attacked here. An intense, bloody battle ensued. Eventually Upton's men reached this earthwork and clung to it, despite repeated attempts that evening to retake it. "At the first ray of dawn it [the work] was strengthened and occupied by skirmishers; and during our stay at Cold Harbor, which lasted until midnight of June 12th, it remained our front line…." -- Theodore Vaill, Upton's Brigade This is a rare surviving example of a "turned" entrenchment, used by each army and consequently facing in two different directions.
5. COLD_150606_063.JPG: Keep Digging: These trenches represent a dramatic change in battlefield tactics. When the two armies met on this ground in 1862, soldiers fought shoulder to shoulder; victory was often dependent upon the success or failure of a dramatic charge. By 1864, field fortifications played an increasingly significant role in determining the outcome of a battle. Despite the obvious advantage held by an entrenched army, commanders continued to order frontal assaults against these nearly impregnable positions, resulting in enormous casualties.
6. COLD_150606_066.JPG: These earthworks are visible reminders of the heavy fighting that occurred here. Please help preserve these fragile earthworks for future generations by not climbing or walking on them.
7. COLD_150606_072.JPG: Keep Your Head Down: This shallow, winding depression is all that remains of a "zigzag" constructed by Union troops in June 1864. In trench warfare, soldiers dug ditches, called zigzags or covered-ways, to provide protection from sharpshooters as they moved from one line of entrenchments to another. Soldiers at Cold Harbor crawled through covered-ways carrying heavy loads of rations or ammunition, prompting one infantryman to remark that he felt "like some unholy cross between a pack mule and a snake."
8. COLD_150606_088.JPG: Read's Batallion These cannon mark the approximate position of a four-gun battery belonging to the Richmond Fayette Artillery, part of Major J.P.W. Read's Battalion that held strategic points along the Confederate main line. The battery supported General Alfred H. Colquitt's Georgia brigade on June 1, 1864, and took part in the repulse of a Union attack that evening. On the morning of June 3, Read's gunners were again called to action. They directed an intense and accurate fire toward the advancing Federal infantry -- part of General U.S. Grant's all-out assault against Lee's lines. "few men fell until we reached within [eighty yards] of the enemy's first line, when they opened upon us with canister [and] grape hurling it into our faces and mowing down our lines as wheat falls before the reaper." -- Lt. Eli Nichols, 8th New York Heavy Artillery "It was a country generally flat, with many small clearings, & thin woods, & scattered pines. No long ranges, but favorable to cross fires & smooth bore richochet firing–& I put in position every gun I had." -- Brig. Gen. E. Porter Alexander, Chief of Artillery, First Corps Major John Postell Williamson Read, formerly Chief of Police for Savannah, Georgia, commanded nearly 400 officers and men and 16 guns at Cold Harbor. The unit suffered only seven casualties.
9. COLD_150606_091.JPG: We Must Hold This Line: After two days of bitter combat, Confederate infantry built their final line of defense across this spot. Remnants of that line are visible emerging from the woods to your left. Richmond stood only nine miles to the southwest and General Lee knew that he must hold here. A Federal victory could mean the destruction of his army and the fall of the Confederate capital. Once completed, the opposing battle lines at Cold Harbor stretched nearly seven miles. You are standing at the center of the Confederate position.
10. COLD_150606_094.JPG: Battle of Cold Harbor The Confederate Main Line Here Longstreet's Corps, with Breckinridge and A.P. Hill's Corps to the southward, repulsed on June 3, 1864, fourteen assaults from the East against the confederate main line. The federal losses, about 7000, were the heaviest ever sustained in America in so brief an action. Placed by the Confederate Memorial Literary Society.
11. COLD_150606_097.JPG: Walk in the Footsteps of History: This one-mile walking trail covers historic ground that witnessed two weeks of intense fighting in June 1864. It winds through earthen fortifications built more than a century ago. The Cold Harbor battle raged over thousands of acres, and this loop trail traverses only a small portion of the battlefield. You can help protect the historic earthworks of this site by walking only on the trail. These fragile fortifications can be preserved only through a respectful appreciation of their importance. Allow 45 minutes to complete the trail.
12. COLD_150606_116.JPG: Union Earthworks: Thousands of Union soldiers lived in these fortifications for eleven long days in 1864. The piles of freshly shoveled dirt sheltered the men from the scorching June sun while shielding them from enemy missiles. The lengthy halt at Cold Harbor allowed soldiers of both armies to further perfect the art of self-protection. Powerful defenses like these saved lives, made offensive operations undesirable to both army commanders, and contributed to the stalemate from June 3-12. Tired Union infantrymen built these earthworks between June 1-3, 1864, while under Confederate fire, although the heavy woods here offered some safety. These fortifications are the most visible legacy of what happened here, but they also are the most fragile historic resource on the battlefield. Please admire them without damaging them.
13. COLD_150606_158.JPG: In Reserve: You are standing among entrenchments built by soldiers of the Union Eighteenth Corps less than ? mile from the front lines. At Cold Harbor regiments typically rotated out of the front lines every other day. This explains the many layers of reserve lines seen here. Although not safe from enemy fire, soldiers in reserve could at least relax their vigilance somewhat. A New Hampshire soldier stationed here during the second week of the battle wrote about these reserve positions:
  Bullets come over frequently to our rear lines, after traveling nearly?one third of a mile. The hum of a spent bullet is very peculiar, often giving timely warning of its approach. The enemy's Coehorn mortar shells, too, are very plentiful today. This is our first experience with them, in any number, while we are within our rear trenches. The enemy fires them high into the air whence they seem to come straight down into the rear trenches, with their threatening "whistle-whistle" - "whistle-whistle," and the final crack and whirr of the pieces.
  The Confederate army did not have Coehorn mortars at Cold Harbor. Instead they improvised by burying the back ends of some cannon, which elevated the barrel and allowed the cannoneers to lob conventional artillery rounds high into the air. Men on the receiving end -- like the New Hampshire soldier -- probably could not tell the difference.
14. COLD_150606_168.JPG: The Cold Harbor Killing Fields: The heaviest fighting on June 3 occurred at three separate spots outside the present boundary of the national park. You are looking northward toward one of those places. Two brigades of infantry from the Eighteenth Corps charged from right to left across the flat, open field beyond the creek. The Confederate fortifications were leveled long ago, but in 1864 they provided security for Southern riflemen and artillerists who swept the open ground with their fire. "The surface of the field seemed like a boiling caldron from the incessant pattering and ploughing of shot, which raised the dirt in geysers and spitting sands," wrote a horrified Massachusetts soldier. Many of the terrible tales of Cold Harbor have their origin here: men being shot down so rapidly "that those in rear of them thought they were lying down," and Union soldiers piling up bodies of dead comrades as emergency protection. This ground -- some of the bloodiest at Cold Harbor -- is private property. Please respect it by staying on this side of the pond.
Wikipedia Description: Battle of Cold Harbor
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The Battle of Cold Harbor, the final battle of Union Lt. Gen. Ulysses S. Grant's 1864 Overland Campaign during the American Civil War, is remembered as one of American history's bloodiest, most lopsided battles. Thousands of Union soldiers were slaughtered in a hopeless frontal assault against the fortified troops of Confederate General Robert E. Lee. Grant said of the battle in his memoirs "I have always regretted that the last assault at Cold Harbor was ever made. I might say the same thing of the assault of the 22d of May, 1863, at Vicksburg. At Cold Harbor no advantage whatever was gained to compensate for the heavy loss we sustained."
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