>> next, joseph wheelan recounts the ulysses s. grant led union armies offensive into virginia in may and june of 1864. this program from quail ridge books and music and raleigh, north carolina, is just under one hour. >> [inaudible conversations] >> good evening. welcome to quail ridge books and music. we are honored to have with us the author joseph wheelan. joe has written extensively and i think -- before he began full-time writing he was a

reporter and an editor for "the associated press." his writings have received critical acclaim. his most recent book is "bloody spring: forty days that sealed the confederacy's fate." it's getting rave the hebrews -- rave reviews already. a test that civil war scholars and boss will like. please jokplease, please welcomh wheelan. [applause] >> thank you for inviting me. i really appreciate it. i hope you're all doing well tonight, and thank you for coming. i'm here to talk about my latest book, "bloody spring," which i

say that it is the campaign that sealed the fate of the confederacy. the union campaign in virginia that i described in "bloody spring" spans six weeks, and may to june of 1864, exactly 150 years ago. in my book i make the case that the chain of battles fought by ulysses s. grant's army with the civil war major turning point. are excellent books about the campaign's major battles, but usually this campaign is presented as part of a larger history of the war. surprisingly few one volume books tend to tell the story of the overland campaign. i decided to write one. the names of the major battles, the wilderness, cold harbor are not a special well-known and do

not resonate like shiloh and antietam, vicksburg and gettysburg. but for more than 40 days the armies of the potomac and robert e. lee's army of northern virginia were in nearly continual contact s. grant marched from the river in northern virginia to the gates of petersburg 100 miles away. men were killed every day, sometimes in great numbers. this type of warfare was new to north america. as one general said, carnage became such that the loss of a thousand men in a day was considered no great matter. the romantic chivalry with which the war began vanished into three years of bloodletting. during the spring of 1864, grant would prosecute the war as no other union general had. he would ruthlessly craft is

greatest advantage of numbers, which is exemplar par against general lee's army. during this campaign, the combatants slaughter one another in shocking numbers. both armies made the stakes mainly both armies fled. together, they lost 100,000 men killed, wounded or captured over six weeks. despite grants lack of victory, the campaign shifted initiative permanently to the union and pinned lee to petersburg in richmond. lee was never able to launch another major offensive. president lincoln needed the military victory in the east if he hoped to win reelection in the fall of 1864. he was not optimistic about being reelected. his defeat would mean peace, and the confederacy survival, as a

sovereign nation. lincoln was frustrated by the eastern armies failures over the past few years, despite this huge advantages of manpower and resources. is eastern generals have been timid and slow. and when they did fight, they typically withdrew after one defeat. twice the allowed lee's army to escape over the potomac into virginia. a list of failed union generals was long and included george mcclellan, john pope, burnside and joe hooker. lincoln and all his hopes on the western general, grant, megan general in chief of all the union armies in march 1864, sweeping authority never before bestowed on a union general. grant was an impassive man who won battles. while chain-smoking cigars.

he had a reputation as a strategist who never gave up. grant's 1863 victories at the vicksburg and chattanooga had made him famous. when grant into washington in march 1864, to meet lincoln and four secretary edward stanton was the first time, he was the object of intense curiosity. grant did not look the part of a great general. he was of medium height, or medium weight. he wore a privates nondescript blue uniform with his general stars sewn on the shoulders. one man said he was an ordinary scruffy looking man with a slightly seedy look. someone else thought something different. the look of a man determined to drive his head through a brick wall. dislike -- dislike in washington

and its shoe business, grant chose to direct all the armies while in the field of the army of the potomac, commanded by george meade. with the exception of its great victory at gettysburg, this was a hard look army. it was well-equipped, very large, and slow. the army's sprawling winter camp along the river in northern virginia, grant brought in every available eastern unit until he had over 100,000 men. across the river was the army of northern virginia, inferior in numbers and weaponry, lee's army was well led, thought superbly and moved fast. the two armies have fought every year of the war, and you practically everything that there was to know about one another. general in chief, grant planned a massive campaign against rebel

armies everywhere at once to prevent the enemy from shifting troops from quiet sectors to active ones. you would go from lee and his friend william sherman, to go to atlanta, the army of the james with richmond, and offenses were planned in the shenandoah valley and in mobile, alabama. grant as he said and tended to hammer continuously until he said by mere attrition is no other way there should be nothing left to him. but surrender, he said of robert e. lee. a british historian described grant's campaign as a massive we'll by the right wing, while the unions western armies would march south and east and ultimately into lee's rear. grant's would tend lee's army in

virginia. wednesday may 4 was the day fixed for the campaigns start. grant had never met in combat but they were there with respective armies, most aggressive commanders. both, grant had three infantry course, the second, the fifth and the six. under hancock, warren and sedgwick and shared in command of the cavalry corps. shared and was the only western commander that grant had brought east with them. a fourth infantry corkum the ninth corps, under burnside was on the way. it would give grant 120,000 men, the largest army ever fielded by the union. south of the river into the west were lee's 66,000 soldiers ready to fight the yankees when they

cost -- when they crossed the rapidan river. this was the confederacy's best army. it's three infantry corps, first, second and third were led by james long street and a. p. hill. the famed rebel cavalry commander by jeb stuart. in 1864 and one was revered throughout the south to a masterful strategist and tactician come he was dignified and devoutly religious. yet they need is virginia aristocratic veneer beat the heart of a brawler. lee blog to attack and destroy grant's army. lee intend to strike gripped hard after his army across the rapidan and before it could emerge from the claustrophobic confines of the wilderness. the 15 square miles region of dense woods and tangled undergrowth concealed mobile, streams and swamps.

of the few roads. if grant had to fight leader, his adventures and manpower, artillery, cavalry would be negated. exactly one year earlier in the wilderness lee had beaten general joe poker at chancellorsville and driven him back across the river. the southern victory was tarnished by their best general, stonewall jackson. grant's helped to pass quickly through the wilderness and move around lee's rightfully. if you could impose a union army between lee in richmond, lee would have to fight them in the open. early may 4 confederate lookouts reported yankees crossing the river. by midday lee said the second core and the third court east down parallel roads towards the wilderness about 20 miles

distance. the orange turnpike, the orange plank road. at the point where the two roads intersected at the north-south roads, the turnpike was three miles north of the plank road. james long streets first core was that gordon still 42 miles away, a two-day march. instead of clearing the wilderness, grant's army stopped there that night to secure the wagon trains. it was a mistake. is handed lee a glittering opportunity and one he did not waste. when they fifth dawned, the second core suddenly appeared on the orange turnpike. the union's fifth corps advanced on the rebels, fighting exploded along the road and into the woods. the men repelled all the unions

attacks. fighting spread to the orange plank roadway the third corps arrived. all that initially stood between the rebels and the road, which if that would've wrecked wrecked grant's of vincent at the very beginning was a single regiment, the fifth new york cavalry fought a brilliant delaying action until a second core and the division six corps arrived. the infantry division stopped the troops in a bloody battle that lasted hours and left the woods inflames. the second core was the largest, most famous, hardest fighting for in the army of the potomac. when hancock, grant's most reliable general, commanded it. grant would turn to hancock and the second core again and again. when hancock's divisions collided with a third corps at the plank road, the jungle like

vegetation and the thick smoke made it impossible to see more than a dozen pieces ahead in the dark woods. that is until sheets of enemy fire lit up the woods and then fell dead or wounded. the 46 north carolina called it a butchery, pure and simple, unruly by any of the arts of war. someone else described the fighting as a rustle as blind as midnight. artillery and cavalry were all but useless. those outside the woods could not see the actual fighting, just the surreal effect of wounded streamed out on bloodstained stretchers, fresh troops pouring in. when the fighting he did on ma may 5, hills 15,000 men have thought down to toe with up to 40,000 yankees for three hours.

reposing repeated attacks. lee was sure, however, that hancock would attack in the morning, and the third corps was too battered to resist for long. by lee and the hill expected the first corps to arrive during the night, so believing lee and he'll do not require the exhausted to read third quarter rewind these positions are digging deep. the second corps attack the yankees at 4:30 on the turnpike, but the fifth corps we told the attacks. comparatively little occurred through the rest of the day. the plank road was where the action was. at 5 a.m., and cox 40,000 men surged west towards the jumble brigade. longstreet was not there. hancox men overwhelm the confederates and they were driven back.

as his mainstream for the rear, lee try to rally them, but he could not. lee and he'll knew if hancock was not stopped, the army of northern virginia's destruction was at hand. the situation at its most critical for the confederates along streets first corps suddenly reached the battlefield. jogging the last two miles after marching all might. it was one of the most dramatic moments of the war. hills men went wild with excitement. one soldier wrote that as long streets regiment swept by, they yelled themselves nearly down to choosing. the texas brigade reached lee's headquarters first and they saw the texans come out with the lee, red-faced with emotion, shouted, texans always move them. texans roared their approval.

lee spur to travel up to the texans front line as they begin to advance on the yankees. when they saw that lee and tended to attack within, the texans refused to continue unless he went to the rear. me new lee was the one indispensable man in the confederate army. lee's blood was up and he wasn't listening. sergeant seize travelers rivalry and an eight finally persuaded him to move farther to the rear. long streets powerful counter attacks since the yankees reeling. been longstreet launched a surprise frank -- flank attack and force the yankees back to the starting point. longstreet was preparing to launch a second flank attack when disaster struck. longstreet and a group of riders were passing between two rebel

regiments are when they were hit by friendly fire. longstreet was shot in the neck. lee's warhorse survived but was out of action for month. it reminded the rebels of stonewall's accidental wounded knee just a few miles away at chancellorsville. lee's aid, taylor, wrote a strange fatality attended us. lee called off the flank attack. several hours later he instead launched a massive frontal attack on hancox entrenched men. it was a failure. it turned out to be lee's last major attack of the war. both armies lost heavily in a two-day wilderness battle. grant's army 17,600 killed, wounded or captured.

the army of northern virginia was wiped out. some units were nearly wiped out. the second vermont lost two-thirds of its men on may 5 when it helped stop the capture of the road. the texas brigade lost 550 of its 800 men during long streets under attack the next day. the question i was, what would grant do next? in union army veteran expected him to emulate his predecessors and we cross the rapidan river and go into camp. lee however never believed grant would withdraw. he and grant were sometimes uncannily alike in their strategic thinking. he thought grant would push on to the court house, major crossroads to the south.

it was what lee would have done. it was exactly what grant did. grant's army began moving the night at may 7 and 8th when the yankees realize they were turning south and not north to we cross the rapidan, they cheered and shouted come on to richmond. grant thrilled lincoln with his message, i propose to fight it out on this line if it takes all summer. win or lose, grant would go ahead. longstreet who was a friend of grant's before the war had warned his fellow officers not to underestimate grant. he told them, we must make up our mind minds to get in line of battle and to stay there. for that men will fight u this every day and every hour until the end of the war. lee faster moving army at two

pots of in the first, although just barely and block the path of the army of the potomac. on the north side of this crossroads down, lee funding of the most formidable field for vacation seen into the time in the war. they covered five miles, high ground between the rivers. the rebels cleared kill zones in from their position. they installed bayonet like habitats to entangle and attacking. bid the trenches topped by had logged that shielded the defenders and gave them firing ports. the components were nothing new. they are combinations were ingenious. from this point forward fortifications became the wars major teacher on -- major feature on the war front.

the foldable point in lee's line was an anomaly that jetted northwards, about two-thirds of a mile wide, three quarters of a mile deep. the rebels called it the mule shoe. the yankees refer to it as -- but it became better known as the bloody angle. from 882 the 11th grant's corps tried flanking attacks as well as frontal attacks on the hill where they lost thousands of men. nothing succeeded. on may 12 at 4:35 a.m., the yankees unleashed a massive attack on the rebels. hancox second corps shock troops led the attack, 20,000 men striking in area no wider than a quarter-mile. the yankees broke through.

lee organize a counter attack that staunch the flood of yankees. at great cost to confederate brigades drove the enemy back. they are the fighting became close quarters. grant's meant on one side and the rebels on the other. union troops continued to pour into the area into a 40,000 were crammed into a small area. sometimes 12 deep or more. the close quarters fighting was the most fast fighting of the war. in the pouring rain combatants fired their weapons into each other's faces, stab one another with bayonets and hurled their bayonet in muskets like javelins. digits on both sides of contrition and filled up with bodies, blood and rainwater. the unio union battery that lasd the enemy at close range lost all but two of the batteries 23

officers and men in just minutes to the pelting musket fire. horses lay dead everywhere. for 20 hours, frenzied fighting went on without pause. man collapsed in the mud and slept briefly. the wounded were trampled down in the flooded ditches by their comrades. some ground. the confederates wrote that the bullets flew in sheets that cut down trees all around. the intensive musket fire toward the dead and wounded two pieces. around midnight the fighting finally ended. then during the night the rebels slipped away to a new position they had dug three quarters of a mile behind. the exhausted yankees didn't know they were gone until the

next morning. the scene '04 greeted them. bodies lay six deep in places. some corpses atop the earthworks were so bullet riddled that they had become more like piles of jelly that distinguish the forms of human life. "new york times" correspondent william swinton described it as one hideous area. union losses that day totaled 9000. the confederate lost nearly 200 men. in the days ahead, grant further maneuvers and attacks failed to gain any ground. spotsylvania is one of lee's greatest triumphs. but some rebels were becoming troubled by grant's seemingly inexhaustible manpower. they said killing yankees was like killing mosquitoes. to gain for every one killed.

union losses in spotsylvania were staggering 18,400. in 15 days of campaigning, grant's army had lost 37,000 men, nearly one-third of his army of 120,000. and cox corps suffered most, 11,500, nearly half of what it began with. lee's total losses were less, 12,600 spotsylvania, 22700 total. but they cut deep. 35% of the 66,000 troops that fought in the wilderness were now dead, wounded or in captivity. during the night of may 20 and 21st, the union army slipped away from spotsylvania to the southeast. grant again hoped to get between lee and richmond and forsake on active battle. and again tried to traveling the

inside out was quicker. on the south banks of the north and the river, lee's chief engineer, general martin smith, devised a brilliant defensive alignment that resembled an inverted v., the apex aimed at the river. the rebels could not let anyone attacking. a river and a swamp anchored its two legs, meaning lee's lines could not be flanked. but even better, when grant's brigades crossed to the right and left in the apex, its two wings were separated by lee's defenses. in order for one wing to reinforce the other, they would have to cross the river twice. the confederates could quickly shuttle troops from one side of the fee to the other.

that be would also enable lee to suddenly shift his manpower to one side and attack. however lee was incapable of doing this. with long straight wounded and had -- hill temporarily sidelined, lee was working harder than ever. atypically rose at 3 a.m. after just a few hours sleep, and with a small staff sought all the army strategic tactical and logistical needs. long days in the saddle, stress and hasty meals had taken a toll on his 57 year old body. a year earlier lee had suffered a minor heart attack. his hair, iron gray when the war began, had turned silver white. this trouble now with this scenario. he was unable to leave his tent and there was no one to take --

dysentery. there was no to take his place. lee was too sick to utilize his deformation to utilize grid. there was no stonewall jackson, no long straight, no jeb stuart to whom to delegate authority. union probes revealed the contours of the rebel defensive formation, grant elected not to attack. he maneuvered again to the southeast to try to get between lee and richmond and force a decisive battle. at daybreak may 27, the confederate scouts reported union entrenched was empty. the two armies jockeyed northeast of richmond, gravitating to a place called cold harbor. it was mother to the veterans of both armies who have thought at nearby gains his mail in 1862. in fact they reoccupied the old board of edition, their

positions exactly reversed. on may 31 and june 1 the armies thought engagements for position. grant hope a massive attack on the rebel right wing would lead to a breakthrough. if not, he could maneuver again to the southeast. he scheduled the assault for june 2. but his troops were not ready so the attack was postponed until the next morning. at 4:30 a.m. on june 3, the yankees attacked and the rebels were ready for them. the extra day had enabled the confederates to finish a series of cunning defenses over the varied terrain. when they were done, they were dashed and overlooked overlapping fields of fire. the assault was a disaster.

although many units did not attack at all. union captain james mcginniss said the lead and iron filled the air as the snowflakes and then angry driving storm. private nelson armstrong said the army seemed to melt away like a frost in july. alabama brigade artillery is william dan said the infantry and the napoleon guns simply for the yankees to pieces. in minutes not a yankee was standing. confederate general evander said it was not war. it was a murder. after a few hours the attacks were suspended. the union lost about 5000 men in less than one hour. the seventh new york heavy artillery lost more than 400 men in 20 minutes.

rebel losses on june 3 were small. days afterwards, burial details found a bloodstained diary collected from the union battlefield. the diaries final entry read june 3, cold harbor, i was killed. grant attempted no further attacks at cold harbor. in the armies settled into a 10-mile front. these trenches and in such an artillery and sniper fire purely for shattered world war i. men were killed or wounded every hour during the daytime. on june 12, grant stole another march on lee. his army maneuvered down to the james river and crossed on a 2100-foot long pontoon bridge assembled by army engineers in just hours. grant intended to capture

petersburg before lee could get there, but the yankees were too slow and bungled the operation. when they did attack on june 18, lee's men had arrived. grant lost 11,000 men in fuel attacks on rebel fortifications. they would be plenty of fighting at peach for the little had changed for nine months. grant's overland campaign had ended in a stalemate. in the north many judge the campaign a failure. lee's army was, in fact, richmond had not been captured. they were appalled are the losses of grant's campaign. 66,000 union soldiers killed, wounded or captured between may 5 and june 18. this the gold two-thirds of the union casualties during the wars previous three years.

less than half of the confederate army had marched into the wilderness and petersburg six weeks later. lee lost 35,000 men. considerably fewer than grant's losses, lee could not be wholly replaced. grant's could. grant and lincoln were not discouraged. grant had put lee in a box at petersburg and richmond. lee encouraged grant, he said, hold on, with a bulldog grip, and shoot and shoot as much as possible. it was a true lee's army was still intact, battered though it was, tired, ragged and dirty. yet their spirits remain high. but the bloody battles of the wilderness, spotsylvania and cold harbor had a price.

transkei was now under siege. they would not fight again in northern virginia or mount another major offensive like it had in 1862 and 1863. lee had worn his generals they must fight it out in the field. if it became a siege, he said, defeat would become inevitable. he was correct. the tide had changed. so, are there any questions, i'd be happy to try to answer them. yes? [inaudible] grant had such a terrible time between the mexican war and the civil war. do you have any account for that ?-que?-que x pc and have everything going for him as general. >> i don't know. he was a terrible businessman

and unlucky. he ran a farm in missouri, and he worked so hard and nothing works. he sold firewood on the street corner, and he ended up having to basically go back to his father and work in moline, illinois. -- galena, illinois. he had no head for that for civilian life. he certainly had a knack once you get going for army life. but it's hard to account for the. sherman had the same problem. sherman, when he left the army and before he came back in, it was a series of disappointments. he never caught on anywhere. he tried. he was smart but nothing ever

really worked. so i guess those guys, they were made for military life and war. >> in your opinion what would you say that -- [inaudible] >> between lee and grant? i don't think so, so much. i don't think, well, lee was trying to save the confederacy. he wasn't trying to make a point. and grant was just trying to win by fighting the way that he did. i think at that point in the war, it was just grinding sort of warfare to the end, or to the death. rather than egos. yes.

[inaudible] >> excuse me? how close to what? [inaudible] >> oh, not at all. not all. lincoln was so happy when he pressed on bad he knew that the only way they could win was to lose a lot of people, but to keep going and to overwhelm the confederacy with waves of blue coats basically. so there was never any question. i think when they got to petersburg there were some members of congress bad, a lot of grumbling there, but that was about it. lincoln was behind them all the time.

[inaudible] every time to go north, and this time they go south. electric nature of that. the other side, the confederate newspapers, the confusion and despair was the fact the union wasn't playing by the same rules. you fall back to regroup and grant said i'm still coming. they were like, we are out of men. >> exactly. he knew how to play that. yes. [inaudible] >> it was the observation that, when the union army finish the battle of wilderness they went south instead of north and across the river, and how this is different from before, and have the union army was exulted

over that, actually. most of them were. also during that, actually during the night when the union army started south, the confederates were very lucky to get to spotsylvania first. they were supposed to leave during the night and then rest and then continue the rest of the way. but because the woods were on fire, there was no place to rest. they were just lanes everywhere so they pressed on. and the cavalry was holding off the union troops as they came in towards spotsylvania. and once again the confederates running the last mile or so to get into the entrenchment and stop them. a close thing.

[inaudible] >> well, the soldiers in the south i think were trying to drive off the invaders. they viewed the union army as the invading army come in getting their state and the country. the north, i think it was a real feeling of patriotism and a belief, a strong belief in the union, preserving the union. i think those were the two on either side, the main reasons. and then there was, later in the war, the union soldiers, union army resulted, had to resort to the draft, and they had to pay people to come in. the bounty hunters they call them, and they were these people who came in in order to get the $300 bounty and they would go to the union army and they were get

into a unit and then they would take off as soon as they could, and then try to get a bounty in another town. so they had a problem, the northern armies, with desertions. and later in the southern armies, desertions was a tremendous problem early 1865. [inaudible] >> yes, the confederate army, right. >> what did both armies think, confederate and union, learned in the few weeks following the initial assault at cold harbor as far as the beginning of entrenched type warfare that would describe the rest of the war both in atlanta and in petersburg? >> well, i think they learned the power of fortification. they got very good at building. they could, within the paper so

they could build almost impractical -- impregnable fortification. make a good at cutting down timber and everything. but yet, you know, the union kept trying to attack those fortifications. they lost a lot of people in petersburg doing that. and a cold harbor, too. so i think that was what the west learn to it became not a war of maneuvering more, but of just a static situation. that's what it became. >> last week when i was traveling in northern virginia -- [inaudible] why do we americans celebrate the civil war, unlike any other

country? we are all basically -- [inaudible] >> what was the question? >> the question was, why the people in this country, are fascinated and even celebrate the civil war, while people in other countries don't do that so much. and i don't know. i would say the answer would be maybe there was one civil war for us all that there ever was. you look at the population of the country at that time, which was something like 22 million in the north, 11 million in the south, counting the slaves. relatively small population, and the number of casualties, i mean, killed, wounded, maimed coming out of that, it just left an indelible impression.

the fighting was offered just so terrible. so i think that's probably, those are the reasons. >> who commanded longstreet when he was out? >> the command went to richard anderson, a division commander in another corps. so he got it. he commanded it until longstreet came back months later. [inaudible] >> no one asked what happened to jeb stuart. [laughter] that was kind of a whole because i said lee no longer could rely on longstreet or stonewall or jeb stuart, but what happened to them was that he was killed during the spotsylvania

campaign. phil sheridan had written off with the cavalry corps. he yet convinced grant petty could lead the cavalry corps toward richmond and draw stuart into a battle and destroy the confederate cavalry. and this he did at a place called yellow tavern about six miles north of richmond. during the battle, stewart was mortally wounded by a union soldier from michigan with a pistol, shot him in the side. he was taken to richmond and he died there the next day. so there was, that was a big hole in the confederate army. they had some good confederate commanders that could take his

place, more or less but nothing quite like stuart. so that was another loss during that campaign. >> by the end of the battle, the situation as far as military supplies, guns and ammo, where those well supplied? >> guns and mo -- >> you know, after cold harbor. >> yes. actually -- the question was after those battles were the armies well supplied with arms and ammunition. and they were with those two things, both armies. the difference was the confederate army didn't have enough food. the troops were of a half starved. it just got worse and worse for

them, but they had a real problem with their commissary. i don't know if you so much at that stage so much a problem of there not been enough food coming in. it was just not getting to the soldiers. and that was really pathetic. and then before the campaign started, one -- i mean, the confederates were getting thin. one of them said lee a little tiny piece of meat on a, bacon on a piece of wood, and he said this is my ration for the day. lee was so embarrassed that he raised again with the commissary and jefferson davis had to get more food and. they never had enough food steadily. they always had in of weapons and ammunition. although by the end of the war it was a real hodgepodge for the confederates as far as their

arms went. they captured weapons. old weapons, weapons that had come over from england. anyway, that's the answer. >> how long did it take you to write the book? >> let's see, it was about a year and a half through the whole research. went up to virginia. actually the university of north carolina libraries, terrific. fascinating to read, just go over there and read the journals and letters of those soldiers. and they were so fluent in their writing, and many of them, kind of put this to shame today. i found it fascinating. there's just a wealth of

material, stuff that i just couldn't fit into the book. did you have a question? >> i was going to say, i think obviously they know they're going to have casualties at the highest levels as well and it does seem again and again that they lost critical players but nobody of similar caliber to replace them. at the beginning of the war, i mean, couldn't they have been training or developing or building to the ones to follow on? >> they kind of had that system. the regimental commanders moved up to brigade, division, and so they just kept promoting people. some really good commanders emerged. for example, on the confederate side john gordon who became, at the end of the war he commanded one of lee's three corps.

at the beginning of the war he was a warrior in georgia. so some people, they had a military ability that emerged during the war. there were a lot of failures. people came in from regular army with some rank at the beginning of the war, they just were not up to it. so there was a real sorting process. confederate truly felt by the end of the war the attrition of the officers more than the union. because i think that was their great advantage at the beginning of the war. they had better leadership. and by the end, those people, many of them were gone. and so lee took on, as i was saying, more and more all the time.

[inaudible] >> oh, i'm sorry. >> kind of a silly question, but you mentioned that a traveler had been injured. was he ever ridden again or get lee everett use him again? also, where did traveler come from our weighted lee acquired in? >> that i don't know, i don't think he was injured. spent at the you said he was chopped? >> no. he would have been if he had been attacked with a texas brigade, certainly. but no, i think he survived the war and moved on a few years. [inaudible] >> i don't know if you've been to his grave in lexington. that, frankly, ion