April 6, 1865, began cold and muddy. As Confederate General Robert E. Lee’s Army of Northern Virginia trudged its way westward, Farmville became the next objective for a badly needed re-supply. Union General Ulysses S. Grant’s armies knew they had to stop the Confederates and hoped to deliver a crushing blow. As dawn broke, elements of the Union 2nd Corps, Army of the Potomac, commanded by General Andrew Humphreys, began their advance towards the Confederates encamped in and around Amelia Court House. Some of the videttes got off course and stumbled upon the westward retreating southern army near Amelia Springs. The iron was hot for the first strike.
The Union initiative then turned westward from Jetersville towards Farmville. At Deatonsville, a small country crossroads, elements of the Confederate 2nd Corps, commanded by General John B. Gordon, were able to post a defense to cover the rear of the retreating army. Union forces made several attacks and eventually carried the works. Most importantly, the Union 6th Corps, Army of the Potomac, and the cavalry of the Army of the Shenandoah, moved farther south to the next intersection. There, Union General Phillip Sheridan coordinated the decisive blow that was about to play out.
As Union cavalry and infantry attacked in force at the intersection now known at Holt’s Corner, the Confederate retreat was divided into two factions. Both roads led towards Rice Depot, a stop on the Southside Railroad. As Confederate General James Longstreet’s troops concentrated around Rice Depot, local citizens notified him that a Union force just left the vicinity with intent on destroying the High Bridge over the Appomattox River outside of Farmville. Two more Union cavalry divisions moved to strike at yet another intersection farther southwest at the Harper Farm. The retreating Confederates were being struck in the flank and in the rear as they struggled to maintain some semblance of order. The stage was set.
Confederate General’s Richard Anderson and Richard Ewell had their work cut out for them. Three divisions of Union cavalry in Anderson’s front launched both mounted and dismounted attacks. General Ewell deployed to support Anderson, but he was attacked in the rear by the Union 6th Corps after they navigated around the Hillsman Farm and outbuildings. Brutal hand-to-hand combat ensued as both forces tried to rip each other apart on the banks of Little Sailor’s Creek.
Two miles downstream at the confluence of Big and Little Sailor’s Creek, Confederate wagon trains became bogged down in the mire as the bridges collapsed. The bottleneck stretched back to the Lockett Farm where savage and desperate fighting continued between Humphreys and Gordon’s commands. The Confederates deployed along the ridge in the shape of a horseshoe but were overwhelmed by the charging Union soldiers.
The jig was up. General Lee returned to the battlefield as he watched the near complete envelopment and exclaimed, “My God! has the army dissolved?”
It nearly had. Final numbers are approximations, but clearly reflect the Union victory. Confederate losses were between eight and ten thousand men captured, including 10 generals and a naval commadore. An unknown number of killed and wounded were strewn over 25 miles, across four different counties, and in the hands of Union surgeons at the field hospitals to be sent to prisons later. Most of the captured soldiers were sent to Point Lookout, Maryland. Union losses of killed and wounded were also in the thousands. The victory at Sailor’s Creek came at a heavy price.
As General Lee informed Confederate President Jefferson Davis of the loss, Phillip Sheridan sent a telegraph to Ulysses S. Grant. Sheridan stated that, “If the thing is pressed I think that Lee will surrender.” Union President Abraham Lincoln received the message and responded, “Let the thing be pressed.”
