The Battle of Appomattox Court House was one of the last battles of the American Civil War, taking place at Appomattox Court House, Virginia on 9 April 1865. General Ulysses S. Grant's Union Army of the Potomac cut off Robert E. Lee's Army of Northern Virginia as it attempted to retreat west to join the Army of Tennessee in North Carolina, forcing over 28,000 Confederate soldiers to surrender. Lee's surrender effectively ended the war in Virginia and led to the surrender of Confederate forces in North Carolina, Alabama, and Louisiana from April to June 1865.
Background[]
Following the 1 April 1865 Battle of Five Forks, Confederate States Army General Robert E. Lee was forced to abandon the Petersburg defenses and escape potential encirclement by retreating from the Richmond-Petersburg area on the night of 2-3 April. Lee planned to reassemble his Army of Northern Virginia at Amelia Court House and then join forces with Joseph E. Johnston's Army of Tennessee in North Carolina. Lee failed to find provisions at Amelia on 4 April, resulting in his army's continued withdrawal to Appomattox Station, where another supply train awaited him. Along the war, a fourth of his army was cut off by the pursuing Union Army at the Battle of Sailor's Creek on 6 April and was ultimately forced to surrender. This battle delayed Lee's army long enough for the Union cavalry general Philip Sheridan to reach Appomattox Station first and capture Lee's supplies. On 7 April, following the Battle of Cumberland Church and the Battle of High Bridge, Grant suggested to Lee that it was time to surrender, and, while declining Grant's request, Lee was open to receiving Grant's terms. On 8 April, George Armstrong Custer's cavalry captured and burned three Confederate supply trains at Appomattox Station. The Army of the Potomac and the Army of the James were able to converge on Appomattox and threaten to cut off Lee's retreating army as the general aimed to reach the supplies and rail hub at Lynchburg. On 8 April, a battalion of the 15th Pennsylvania Cavalry Regiment was detached from Stoneman's Raid to dissuade Lee from moving to Lynchburg. Lee planned to break through the Union cavalry and reach Lynchburg, and Lee continued to delay a surrender to Grant.
Battle[]
At dawn on 9 April 1865, the Confederate II Corps under John B. Gordon attacked Philip Sheridan's cavalry on the road to Lynchburg. While Charles H. Smith's first line was forced back, Ranald S. Mackenzie and George Crook's next line slowed the Confederate advance. Gordon's troops made good progress until the Confederate cavalry fled towards Lynchburg on seeing two Union corps approach, ready for battle. Gordon's isolated corps was attacked by Edward Ord's troops as the Union II Corps moved against James Longstreet's corps to the northeast. Eventually, Gordon was forced to request support from Longstreet, and Lee, rather than needlessly sacrifice the rest of his men, decided to meet with Grant to discuss a surrender. Longstreet supported the decision tos urrender, as did every other officer apart from Longstreet's artillery chief Edward Porter Alexander, who predicted the ensuing surrender of every other Confederate army. Lee requested a suspension of fighting while discussing surrender terms with Grant, and the two men met at the McLean House that afternoon. A well-dressed Lee met with a mud-spattered Grant in the parlor of the McLean House and negotiated the surrender of the Army of Northern Virginia. The surrendered Confederates were not to be imprisoned or prosecuted for treason, officers were allowed to keep their personal effects, horses, and sidearms, and the defeated men were allowed to take home their horses and mules for spring planting. At 4 AM, the terms of surrender were completed, written down by Grant's Seneca adjutant Ely S. Parker.
On 10 April, Lee gave a farewell address to his army, and, on 12 April, the Confederates ceremonially stacked their arms and disbanded the Army of Northern Virginia. 28,356 Confederate officers and men were surrendered and paroled. Roughly 175,000 starving Confederates remained in the field across the country, many of them scattered throughout the South in garrison or guerrilla bands and the rest in three major Confederate commands. Johnston's Confederate army in North Carolina surrendered to William Tecumseh Sherman at Bennett Place in Durham on 26 April in the largest surrender of the war; 89,270 Confederate troops laid down their arms. Richard Taylor's forces in Alabama, Mississippi, and Louisiana surrendered at Citronelle, Alabama on 4 May, while President Jefferson Davis dissolved the CSA government at Washington, Georgia on 5 May. On 9 May, Nathan Bedford Forrest surrendered at Gainesville, Alabama, followed by Edmund Kirby Smith's Trans-Mississippi Department on 2 June 1865 in Galveston, Texas and Stand Watie's Cherokee rebels on 23 June 1865 in Doaksville, Choctaw Nation. The last battle of the war, the Battle of Palmito Ranch, occurred in Texas on 12-13 May 1865, while the CSS Shenandoah surrendered in Liverpool on 6 November 1865.
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