“But such is the price…”
With 2024 fully underway, the country commemorates the 160th anniversaries of the Civil War’s third full year. The spring campaign of 1864 opened with the climatic and anticipated clash between Confederate General Robert E. Lee’s Army of Northern Virginia and the Union’s newcomer from the west, Lieutenant General Ulysses S. Grant. Over the course of nearly two and a half months, the armies fought doggedly at places such as the Wilderness, Spotsylvania Court House, and Cold Harbor. Grant, unable to breach Lee’s lines and turn the Confederate right flank, set his sights on the large transportation hub—Petersburg.
Petersburg served the Confederate war effort throughout the conflict. However, the end of the Overland Campaign brought the armies to bear on the Cockade City by mid-June, 1864. The second largest city in Virginia boasted a population of 18,000 people, operated manufacturing centers such as cotton mills and tobacco warehouses, but most importantly five major railroads went in and out of the city, vital arteries that transported war materiel and troops. In his effort to cripple Lee’s army and capture Richmond, Grant determined the best course of action to be the capture of Petersburg. Severing this center would rob the Lee, Richmond, and Confederate forces in central Virginia lines of communication and supply with points further south into the Carolinas.
With multiple operations conducted in Virginia simultaneously, Grant attempted to “box in” Lee. A Federal push towards Lynchburg would close off the western portion of the box; Confederate cavalry were occupied north of Richmond; Lee was hemmed in and pressed in the east. The last portion of the box was the south, and a cavalry raid could potentially seal in Lee, making Petersburg an untenable position. With that, the Wilson-Kautz Raid, a joint Federal column under the command of Brigadier Generals James H. Wilson and August V. Kautz, was launched.
The Wilson-Kautz Raid, carried out from June 22 to July 1, 1864, stands as one of the heroic tragedies of the war. The ten-day raid resulted in the destruction of approximately sixty miles of rail line along the Richmond-Danville and South Side Virginia Rail Roads; the war was brought in earnest to Southside Virginia’s heartland in places like Burkeville Junction, Halifax, Charlotte, and Mecklenburg Counties; over one thousand enslaved African-Americans made an attempt at freedom and nearly four hundred made it to the safety of Federal lines. The raid, however, involved less than ten thousand soldiers all told, until the end with the First Battle of Ream’s Station on June 29, 1864. With that, there is little of a “foot print” in terms of written historical record. Accounts from the raid as it transpired are scarce, as are recollections from the veterans’ golden years. The accounts that do survive and those that have been discovered offer incredible stories of harrowing deeds, tragic loss, and daring survival.
One such account involves the Battle of Nottoway Court House, otherwise known as the Battle of the Grove or the Battle of Blacks and Whites. Once the Federal raiding column of 5,500 troopers set out, Confederate forces were quickly made aware of the threat. The cavalry division under the command of Major General William Henry Fitzhugh “Rooney” Lee gave chase with about 2,000 sabers. The grey clad riders caught up with General Wilson’s 3,500 man division near Nottoway Court House. A pitched battle of back-and-forth advance and withdraw erupted on June 23. One of Wilson’s regiments, the 8th New York, found itself in the thick of the fight. One officer of the 8th New York, Captain James Sayles, conducted himself with exemplary courage during the fight. At one point, the Confederate troopers raised a shout and surged forward, causing the men of the 8th to fall back to the rear. Captain Sayles, in order to see to the safety of his own men, ordered them to fall back while he maintained his positon and fired his pistol from cover.
The regimental commander, Lieutenant Colonel E. M. Pope, penned a letter a month later to a Miss Florence Lee, regarding the death of her friend “Jimmy.” Pope stated,
My Regt accompanied the command of Genl. Wilson on his late raid and on the 23 June we were engaged with the enemy at “Blacks and Whites” Station on the Petersburg and Burkeville R.Rd. The 8th made a charge driving the Rebels about ½ mile and was in turn forced back part of the distance during the return the Rebel line advanced very close to the squadron commanded by Jimmy and he commenced to fire at them with his pistol taking cover behind a tree for the purpose. He was warned by another officer that he should fall back more rapidly or he would be captured, and the line passed on and rallied about 100 feet in rear of the place when the capt was last seen. The above is all that is known except that Jimmy did not back. It is possible that he remained firing at the rebels so long that it was not possible for him to return without a certainty of being shot or he may have been wounded where he was last seen and thus has become unable to return. We report him “missing”….
Lieutenant Colonel Pope reassured Miss Lee that he daily looked for Captain Sayles. General Wilson, meanwhile, first recorded the loss when he cited seventy-five men lost in killed, wounded, and missing at Nottoway Court House. Of those wounded and missing, Wilson stated, “among the latter Captain Sayles of the 8th New York Cavalry, a most gallant and accomplished young officer. He is supposed to have been wounded in the leg during the first advance of the enemy.” Wilson later wrote in his official report of the raid, “Captain Sayles, of Rhode Island, was killed carrying an order to an outlying detachment. He was a most promising officer, young, handsome, gallant, and debonair, and his loss was a great sorrow to his companions….”
General Wilson then finished that portion with a solemn reminder of why preservation of the memory, legacy, and land of America’s Civil War history matters. Wilson stated bluntly, as any old soldier would in the face of combat losses, “but such is the priceless tribute a country often pays for its liberties and institutions.”
The Wilson-Kautz Raid, in the grand pantheon of Civil War history, memory, and study, has received little mention in the thousands, millions even, of tomes written. Due largely to the fact that little exist from a “footprint” left behind by less than 10,000 participants, the raid yet deserves due diligence in updated and continued study and research. While we commemorate the 160th of the Wilson-Kautz Raid, it is highly encouraged to take a trek through Southside Virginia and see some of these sites. The Wilson-Kautz Raid driving tour, one of Virginia’s outdoor museums through the Civil War Trails program, offers a driving tour of the raid routes. A packed cooler of water, lunch, and snacks, and a tank of gas is all it takes to enjoy one of the most scenic drives through Virginia to see some of these sites of great deeds and heroic charges.