What was the most significant event on April 1 during the U.S. Civil War - 2017 update?

In 1864, US Army transport the USS Maple Leaf, returning from carrying troops to Palatka, Florida, was destroyed by a Confederate torpedo in the St. John's River. She was one of several victims in this river, which Southerners had mined with twelve floating torpedoes, each containing 70 pounds of powder.
In 1865, suicide in wartime during the civil war. “Worn down by the stresses of his office, Florida Governor John Milton commits suicide at his plantation, Sylvania. Milton was a capable governor who valiantly defended his state and supplied provisions to the Confederacy, but by the end of the war much of Florida was occupied by Union forces and the state’s finances were depleted. Just before his death, Milton addressed the Florida legislature and said that Yankees “have developed a character so odious that death would be preferable to reunion with them.” Milton was 57 when he put a pistol to his head.”
Tuesday, April 1, 1862: Foote plays a dirty trick on the rebels at Island No. 10. “Union Flag Officer Andrew Foote had determined to steam his gunships past the heavily-defended Island No. 10 during next foggy or stormy night. However, he was incredibly uncomfortable with this idea since it would most certainly be deadly for his fleet. The night of April 1 would prove to be stormy, but even before the tempest blew in, Foote had made arrangements for a sly bit of All Fool’s Day trickery of his own.
He had decided to raid the island under the cover of darkness, and hoped to take out a few guns, giving his fleet an advantage. He selected fifty infantrymen from the 42nd Indiana and fifty sailors to make the raid. Col. George W. Roberts of the 42nd would lead them.
Around 11pm, as the rain fell in the darkness, the 100 men boarded five lifeboats and rowed with muffled oars across the Mississippi to the Confederate island. They would have been completely undetected by the Confederate pickets had a bolt of lightening not illuminated their presence. As they splashed through eighteen inches of water, the sentinels fired and retreated back into the island.
These were all the Confederates Roberts’ raiding party encountered. Quick as the lightening, they were on land, up over the parapets and spiking the guns, driving metal rods into the firing vents, disabling the artillery.
In thirty minutes, Roberts’ troops spiked six guns. They were back on land just as the storm came to ferocious life. Before dawn, a tornado twisted through the town of New Madrid and cut a swath along the river. It hit both the Confederate and Union camps, killing and wounding several. [6]
[6] Island No. 10 by Larry J. Daniel and Lynn N. Bock, Alabama University Press, 1996.
http://civilwardailygazette.com/george-b-mcclellans-fuzzy-math-and-opportune-egress/
Wednesday, April 1, 1863: Grant wishes to avoid “Immense Sacrifice of Life,” Turns to a new strategy” “At this point, Grant had a couple of plans brewing. The first, which was already underway, involved marching troops south from Milliken’s Bend (above Vicksburg) to New Carthage (below Vicksburg). Supplies had always been an issue and so he was opening a waterway to more easily ship them. This plan, however, wasn’t directly connected to taking Vicksburg. It was a vague attempt to first take Port Hudson, far to the south, get General Nathaniel Banks’ Union Army of the Gulf, and then attack Vicksburg. It would, Grant suspected, take months, if it ever happened at all.
The second plan wasn’t so much a plan as it was a brutal infantry assault upon Haynes’ Bluff, home of the prominent Confederate battery anchoring the right flank of the Vicksburg defenses. Prior to Grant’s last attempt to get around the Confederate right via Steele’s Bayou, he figured that his last resort was “for me but to collect all my strength and attack Haynes’ Bluff.” He conceded that it would “necessarily be attended with much loss,” adding,”I think it can be done.”
With that in mind, Grant, along with William Tecumseh Sherman and Admiral David Dixon Porter boarded the USS Tuscumbia, and ironclad gunboat, to see for himself what might await his men should he order them to assault it.
To get close enough to see the bank where they’d have to land the troops, the Tuscumbia had to get within rage of the Rebel guns. As she moved forward, her Dahlgren smoothbores were trained upon where they believed the hidden enemy batteries to be. The closer they pulled towards the Confederate emplacements, the more troublesome it became. The Rebels, not wanting to disclose the location of their batteries, simply would not fire.
Admiral Porter believed that they were trying to lure the Federal craft closer to where they had planted torpedoes (underwater mines triggered to explode when a ship brushed up against them). In hopes of convincing the Rebels to expose their position, the Tuscumbia’s guns fired five times. Not once did they hit anything, and not once did the Confederates reply.
As General Grant looked upon Haynes’ Bluff, he could see that an assault simply wouldn’t work. In a letter written to Admiral Porter the following day, Grant explained: “After the reconnaissance of yesterday, I am satisfied that an attack upon Haynes’ Bluff would be attended with immense sacrifice of life, if not with defeat. This, then, closes out the last hope of turning the enemy by the right.”
With an all out assault all out of the question, Grant turned his attention to the New Carthage plan. Perhaps it could be dovetailed into something more directly connected to defeating Vicksburg.
“I have sent troops through from Milliken’s Bend to New Carthage, to garrison and hold the whole route and make the wagon road good,” explained Grant, referring to General John McClernand’s XIII Corps. And Grant was fully determined to establish a base of operations at New Carthage and attack the Rebel batteries at Grant Gulf and/or Warrenton.
“It is important to prevent the enemy from further fortifying either of these places,” wrote Grant to Porter. “I am satisfied that one army corps, with the aid of two gunboats, can take and hold Grand Gulf until such time as I might be able to get my whole army there and make provision for supplying them.”
In for a penny, in for a pound seemed to be Grant’s new philosophy. With what he considered his last resort being impossible without the sacrifice and slaughter of his own men, Grant immediately wished to commit his entire army to a project meant at first for a single corps.
There was a sort of snag, however. General John McClernand and Grant had never gotten along. In fact, very few in the Army of the Tennessee got along with McClernand. As Grant, Sherman and Porter were steaming up the Yazoo River towards Haynes’ Bluff, McClernand was at Milliken’s Bend preparing his troops for the march to New Carthage.
Thus far, things seemed to be pointed in the right direction. McClernand believed that his cavalry vanguard might be in New Carthage in a day or so. “I am now repairing the roads and bridges between here and Richmond, a distance of 12 miles, including a floating bridge of 200 feet in length,” he reported to Grant, “and will soon commence repairing the road from that place to Carthage, and constructing barges to ply between the same places, unless stopped by unknown obstacles.”
But when Grant ordered McClernand to provide 2,000 troops (out of his 30,000 or so – though only 18,000 were with him at Milliken’s Bend) to help dig out a levee, the unlikable General balked. “Of course, the detail will be furnished,” assured McClernand, “but I think it probable that you would not have ordered it with a fuller knowledge of my operations.”
He went on to explain that “the prospect so far is quite encouraging, perhaps more so than that afforded by the Duckport enterprise, and I hope you will find it consistent with your general views to leave me to prosecute my present undertaking with all the resources at my disposal.”
From the start, McClernand had wanted (and had actually been promised by President Lincoln) a fully independent command. Now, when he most needed to follow orders, Grant must have been wondering if he could be relied upon. [1]
[1] Sources: Official Records, Series 1, Vol. 24, Part 3, p126, 163, 164, 168-169; Official Naval Records, Vol. 24, p519-520.
http://civilwardailygazette.com/grant-wishes-to-avoid-immense-sacrifice-of-life-turns-to-a-new-stretegy/
Friday, April 1, 1864: Catching Up With General Steele In Arkansas “By this time, most of Nathaniel Banks’ troops had left Alexandria, Louisiana on their tramp north toward Shreveport. Thus far, the plan was running a bit behind, but two of the columns, the first under A.J. Smith, the second under Banks himself, had united and were pushing forward (more or less) as one. The third column, which was to descend from Little Rock, Arkansas, was a bit slower still.
Under the command of General Frederick Steele, the Army of Arkansas (basically, the Seventh Corps, 13,000-strong) had left Little Rock on the 23rd of March, reaching Arkadelphia, along the Washita River, seventy miles southwest, five days later. General Banks was, by this point, wondering whether Steele was going to show up at all.
“My forces are moving on Shreveport,” he relayed to Steele, “the advance probably now above Natchitoches. The gun-boats are reconnoitering the river below. Please inform me as to your positions and intentions.” Messages sent between Banks and Steele took about a week to arrive, so trying to coordinate any sort of meeting was nearly futile.
After his late start, Steele didn’t have the easiest of times. The rains had churned the roads away from Little Rock to mud, forcing a halt until they could be corduroyed – a detail of Colored Troops hewing trees and placing them across the path. After crossing the Saline River, things got worse.
“Upon leaving the bottom,” reported Captain Junius Wheeler, Steele’s Chief Engineer, “we met with long and steep hills of a stick red clay, which clung to the wheels with great tenacity, and to overcome it the animals had to exert their utmost strength. So exhausted were the mules that they were unable to make but a short march.”
On the 26th, three days after leaving, having traveled only forty-five miles, they arrived in Rockport, finding it “almost entirely deserted.” But here they found a plateau of “quite high, but gently rolling ground.” After scouting for a place to cross the Washita River, Captain Wheeler discovered a ford a mile and a half below the town. As its deepest depth reached no more than thirty inches, here the whole army could cross.
But the river was rising quickly. The rains that had inundated them soon after leaving Little Rock were finally flowing into the rivers. Wheeler’s discovery was found too late, and by the time Steele’s army was ready to cross, the river was flooding and a bridge had to be laid.
Wheeler placed it just above the ford, which would allow the infantry and artillery to utilize the dry span while the cavalry and wagons slogged and splashed through the deepening water. After all had passed, the entire 217 foot bridge was dismantled and loaded on wagons to be used again.
Before the advance, the Confederates gave little resistance. From time to time, there was skirmishing, but the main column never saw it as they continued toward Arkadelphia.
The next day, the army reached Bayou Roche (literally meaning Rock River). “We found Bayou Roche well named,” continued Captain Wheeler, “for the ford was quite deep and filled with boulders of considerable size.” Still, they crossed with little trouble. Another creek, the Caddo, was scenic, but the company of pioneers had to cross it in an old ferry boat and quickly constructed another bridge – not even touching the bridge the army was dragging behind them. There, the infantry crossed and finally made it to Arkadelphia on the 29th.
The town of Arkadelphia was situated on a bluff, high above the Washita River. “Everything in and around this place indicated its former prosperity,” wrote a colonel under Steele’s command, “the fine residences a little dilapidated and neglected, perhaps, but still bearing signs of better times; its extensive trade, both by river and land, for the steamboats run on the Washita up to this place during two-thirds of the year, and it was also the great thoroughfare to Texas. The sterile lands and deserted farms which we had met thus far on our march gave way to a fertile country and cultivated lands; the marks of war, although visible, were not so legibly written on this portion of the country as on that through which we had passed.”
Inside Arkadelphia itself, the colonel continued, “had been their principal army depots. Here was a powder mill, different machine-shops, and the valuable saltpeter and salt works, from which a great part of Arkansas was drawing this indispensable article.”
By this date, General Steele expected to unite with a second column coming from Fort Smith on the western Arkansas border. Steele sent scouts in the direction he expected the addition troops to be coming, but by this date had heard nothing in reply. Though Steele could not know this, General John Milton Thayer had changed from his intended route. This threw off Steele’s messengers and would took the two out of communication for several days to come.
For several days they waited and rested, finally giving up upon Thayer. Deciding to move again on this date, Steele had a choice before him. He was, according to orders, to march from Arkadelphia to Camden, which was nearly due south. There were three roads leading from his present stop to his next, but when he sent scouts to reconnoiter, he found that none suited his needs. The main road was found to be heavily guarded by Confederates at a nearby river crossing.
Steele instead decided to march southwest on Washington, still sending a sizable party down the main road to Camden to throw off Rebel scouts. On this date, they stepped off, encamping twelve miles away at Spoonville.
For several days they waited and rested, finally giving up upon Thayer. Deciding to move again on this date, Steele had a choice before him. He was, according to orders, to march from Arkadelphia to Camden, which was nearly due south. There were three roads leading from his present stop to his next, but when he sent scouts to reconnoiter, he found that none suited his needs. The main road was found to be heavily guarded by Confederates at a nearby river crossing.
Steele instead decided to march southwest on Washington, still sending a sizable party down the main road to Camden to throw off Rebel scouts. On this date, they stepped off.
Though the Confederates might have been thrown off by Steele’s movements, they were not for long. Under General John Marmaduke, several dispersed brigades were closing in, with three to the Federals’ front, and one to their rear. Expecting the Yankees to take the main road, Marmaduke placed a brigade at the Little Missouri River crossing above Camden (which caused Steele to try another route).
After the Federals arrived in Arkadelphia, Marmaduke tried his best to get his brigades into place, but by this date, they realized that Steele was already on the move. Shortly after the Federals vacated the town, an advanced detachment of the Rebels, who were coming in on their rear, entered town, capturing a dozen soldiers straggling behind. Too exhausted to continue on, the Confederates halted.
The other brigades moved in, with one skirmishing in Steele’s front. By nightfall, Steele was in Spoonville, and Marmaduke was completely aware of it. Apart from the Confederate brigade to Steele’s front, Marmaduke had another eight miles to the east. He had already surmised that Steele was headed south to reinforce General Banks, and decided then to moved swiftly upon him. [1]
[1] Sources: Official Records, Series 1, Vol. 34, Part 1, p657, 659, 661, 665, 673, 731-732, 780, 821, 831, 836; Part 3, p7, 33.”
http://civilwardailygazette.com/catching-up-with-general-steele-in-arkansas/

Below are several journal entries from 1862, 1863, 1864 and 1865 which shed light on what life was like for soldiers and civilians – the good, the bad and the ugly. … I am including journal entries from Sergeant Alexander G. Downing, Company E, Eleventh Iowa Infantry, Third Brigade, "Crocker's Brigade," Sixth Division of the Seventeenth Corps, Army of the Tennessee for each year. I have been spending some time researching Civil War journals and diaries and editing them to fit into this series of Civil War discussions.
In 1861, Abraham Lincoln decided how he would deal with the problem of Fort Sumter.
In 1862, (1) Richmond Daily Dispatch, on this date, publishes an editorial pleading for public cooperation in donating church bells for the making of cannon and (2) Sen. Wright of Indiana speaks on the proposed bill to free the slaves in the District of Columbia.
In 1865, Maj Gen Phil Sheridan gave an account of the Battle of Five Forks : By Sheridan’s original orders (as related by Sheridan), he wanted Ayres and Crawford to attack the Rebel flank squarely and together.
Monday, April 1, 1861, Abraham Lincoln decided how he would deal with the problem of Fort Sumter. Working hand-in-hand now with William H. Seward, Abraham Lincoln wrote the following messages on Monday, April 1.
No originals of these messages have come down to us. There are more than one version of some of them, written by different persons. None of the messages in the record are in Lincoln’s hand, but their essential accuracy is confirmed by David D. Porter who received them from Lincoln’s hand and carried them to New York. (Porter does not tell us what he did with the order addressed to him.)
Executive Mansion, April 1, 1861; to Commandant Andrew H. Foote, commanding Brooklyn Navy Yard
Sir: You will fit out the Powhatan without delay. Lieutenant Porter will relieve Captain Mercer in command of her. She is bound for secret service, and you will under no circumstances communicate to the Navy Department the fact that she is putting out. Abraham Lincoln
Executive Mansion, April 1, 1861 to Captain Samuel Mercer, U.S. Navy
Sir: Circumstances render it necessary to place in command of your ship, and for a special purpose, an officer who is duly informed and instructed in relation to the wishes of the Government, and you will therefore consider yourself detached. Abraham Lincoln
Executive Mansion, April 1, 1861 to Lieutenant David D. Porter
Sir: You will proceed to New York, and with the least possible delay assume command of the Powhatan. Proceed to Pensacola Harbor, and at any cost prevent any Confederate expedition from the mainland reaching Fort Pickens. This order, its object, and your destination will be communicated to no person whatever until you reach the harbor of Pensacola. Abraham Lincoln
http://americancivilwar.com/authors/Joseph_Ryan/150-Year-Anniversary/April-1861/What-Happened-in-April-1861.html
Tuesday, April 1, 1862: Journal of Sergeant Alexander G. Downing, Company E, Eleventh Iowa Infantry, Third Brigade, “Crocker's Brigade,” “Our Division, the First, was reviewed this forenoon by General Grant and Maj. Gen. J. A. McClernand. While the review was in progress three men were seen on the roofs of two small log houses at the southern end of Jones' Field, taking notes on our maneuvers, the number of men in line, etc. They were dressed in butternut suits although, it is said, they had claimed to be Union men; yet when the review was ended no trace of them could be found.”
Tuesday, April 1, 1862: The Richmond Daily Dispatch, on this date, publishes an editorial pleading for public cooperation in donating church bells for the making of cannon: “The Ordnance Bureau of the Confederate States the use of such bells as can be spared during the war, for the purpose of providing light artillery for the public defence. While copper is abundant, the supply of deficient to convert the copper into bronze. Bells contain so much tin that 2400 pounds weight of bell metal, mixed with the proper quantity of copper, will suffice for a field battery of six pieces.
Those who are willing to devote their bells to his patriotic purpose will receive receipts for them and the bells will be replaced, if required, close of the war. . . .”
http://civilwarsesquicentdaily-wolfshield.blogspot.com/search?q=April+1%2C+1862
Tuesday, April 1, 1862: In the U.S. Senate, Sen. Wright of Indiana speaks on the proposed bill to free the slaves in the District of Columbia: “. . . I am no apologist for slavery. I am opposed to it. But I cannot vote for this bill abolishing slavery in the District.
My reason is that the Senate has decided against the principle of colonization. In Indiana we have settled this question explicitly and firmly by constitutional provision. Illinois is doing it. Ohio will do it. We tell you that the black population shall not mingle with the white population in our States. We tell you that in your zeal for emancipation you must ingraft colonization upon your measure. We intend that our children shall be raised where their equals are; and not in a population partly white and partly black; and we know that equality never can exist between the two races.”
http://civilwarsesquicentdaily-wolfshield.blogspot.com/search?q=April+1%2C+1862
Wednesday, April 1, 1863: Journal of Sergeant Alexander G. Downing, Company E, Eleventh Iowa Infantry, Third Brigade “Crocker's Brigade,” “It continues warm and pleasant. All is quiet. I went up town to the division quartermaster to buy provisions for the officers, the captain giving me the money with the order to purchase ten days' provisions. When I returned, the captain noticed among the items of the bill "20 lbs. codfish," and exclaimed, "Why, Alexander, what in thunder are you going to do with salty codfish? You have enough to do the whole company, and there are but three of us!”
Friday, April 1, 1864: Journal of Sergeant Alexander G. Downing, Company E, Eleventh Iowa Infantry, Third Brigade, “Crocker's Brigade,” “The same old thing over and over. I almost wish myself back in the army; everything seems to be so lonesome here. There is nothing going on that is new, and there is no work of any kind.”
Saturday, April 1, 1865: Journal of Sergeant Alexander G. Downing, Company E, Eleventh Iowa Infantry, Third Brigade, “Crocker's Brigade,” “The weather is pleasant. No news of any importance. The camp here is the best we have had since leaving Vicksburg. Our "ranch" is eight feet square, boarded up seven feet high, and has a gable roof of the proper pitch covered over with our rubber ponchos, nailed to the rafters; it will protect us from the worst rainstorm. Our bunks are raised two feet from the ground. We have a door to the "ranch," made of boards, and the latch-string hangs out.”
Saturday, April 1, 1865: “I felt certain the enemy would fight at Five Forks—he had to,” Sheridan recalled, “so, while we were getting up to his intrenchments, I decided on my plan of battle.”
The Confederate front was to be assailed by two divisions of dismounted cavalry under Merritt, while still more feigned an attack on Pickett’s right, while the actual assault would be launched by the entire Fifth Corps upon the enemy’s left. If accomplished, Pickett would be fully isolated from the rest of General Lee’s Army of Northern Virginia.
When Gouverneur Warren managed to get himself to Sheridan’s side, the latter told the former the plan, explaining just how Pickett’s men were posted, and explaining precisely how he wished for them to make the attack. Sheridan had been gifted by Grant the right to relieve General Warren of his post at the head of the Fifth Corps. Not wanting to do this on the very eve of battle, however, Sheridan demurred as all seemed well enough.
“General Warren seemed to understand me clearly,” Sheridan wrote, “and then left to join his command, while I turned my attention to the cavalry, instructing Merritt to begin by making demonstrations as though to turn the enemy’s right, and to assault the front of the works with his dismounted cavalry as soon as Warren became engaged.”
After his own affairs were in order, Sheridan rode to find the Fifth Corps, which was again moving much more slowly than he had hoped.
“I was disappointed that more of the corps was not already up, and as the precious minutes went by without any apparent effort to hurry the troops on to the field, this disappointment grew into disgust. At last I expressed to Warren my fears that the cavalry might expend all their ammunition before the attack could be made, that the sun would go down before the battle could be begun, or that troops from Lee’s right, which, be it remembered, was less than three miles away from my right, might, by striking my rear, or even by threatening it, prevent the attack on Pickett.
“Warren did not seem to me to be at all solicitous; his manner exhibited decided apathy, and he remarked with indifference that “Bobby Lee was always getting people into trouble.” With unconcern such as this, it is no wonder that fully three hours’ time was consumed in marching his corps from J. Boisseau’s to Gravelly Run Church, though the distance was but two miles. However, when my patience was almost worn out, Warren reported his troops ready, Ayres’s division being formed on the west side of the Gravelly Church road, Crawford’s on the east side, and Griffin in reserve behind the right of Crawford, a little different from my instructions. The corps had no artillery present, its batteries, on account of the mud, being still north of Gravelly Run. Meanwhile Merritt had been busy working his men close up to the intrenchments from the angle of the return west, along the White Oak road.” – Philip Sheridan
Sheridan was not pleased at all with Warren’s formation, and Warren, writing after the war, would debate over the wording of said order. Additionally, Warren contested Sheridan’s knowledge of how long it took a corps of infantry to get into position. But finally, at 4pm, the Fifth Corps was ready to attack, and they stepped off.
“After the forward movement began,” related Warren in his official report, “a few minutes brought us to the White Oak road, distant about 1,000 yards. There we found the advance of General Mackenzie’s cavalry, which, coming up the White Oak road, had arrived there just before us. This showed us for the first time that we were too far to our right of the enemy’s left flank.” With frustration, Warren realigned his men, so as to bring his line on Pickett’s left.
“Fortunately for us,” Warren continued, “the enemy’s left flank so rested in the woods that he could not fire at us as we crossed this open field, and the part of it that face us formed a very short line. This General Ayres attacked at once, the firing being heavy, but less than usually destructive, on account of the thick woods. The rapid change of front by General Ayres caused his right flank to first get in advance of General Crawford’s, owing to the greater distance the latter had to move, and exposed the former to being taken in flank by the enemy.”
By Sheridan’s original orders (as related by Sheridan), he wanted Ayres and Crawford to attack the Rebel flank squarely and together. What Warren was doing was as tangled as the night previous. The situation slid into disarray when Crawford’s entire division became isolated from the rest of Warren’s line, drawing Griffin’s Division along with it. “The deflection of this division on a line of march,” Sheridan wrote, “frustrated the purpose I had in mind when ordering the attack, and caused a gap between Ayres and Crawford, of which the enemy quickly took advantage, and succeeded in throwing a part of Ayres’s division into confusion. At this juncture I sent word to General Warren to have Crawford recalled; for the direction he was following was not only a mistaken one, but, in case the assault at the return failed, he ran great risk of capture.”
But nobody could find Warren. Sheridan then sent for Griffin, who had seen Crawford’s mistake and was doing his best to pull his own division out of the debacle. Even before Sheridan’s staff could find him, Griffin accomplished this and more, joining Ayres. This was, perhaps, not as pretty as Sheridan would have liked, but it was enough.
“After this change of front,” recorded Ayres in his report, “the troops were pushed forward and soon came upon the left flank of the enemy, which was thrown back at right angles with his main line and covered by a strong breast-work, screened behind a dense undergrowth of pine and about 100 yards in length. This breast-work my troops charged and took at the bayonet’s point, capturing in carrying it over 1,000 prisoners and several battle-flags.”
Sheridan added: “When Ayres’s division went over the flank of the enemy’s works, Devin’s division of cavalry, which had been assaulting the front, went over in company with it; and hardly halting to reform, the intermingling infantry and dismounted cavalry swept down inside the intrenchments, pushing to and beyond Five Forks, capturing thousands of prisoners. The only stand the enemy tried to make was when he attempted to form near the Ford road. Griffin pressed him so hard there, however, that he had to give way in short order, and many of his men, with three pieces of artillery, fell into the hands of Crawford while on his circuitous march.
“The right of Custer’s division gained a foothold on the enemy’s works simultaneously with Devin’s, but on the extreme left Custer had a very severe combat with W. H. F. Lee’s cavalry, as well as with Corse’s and Terry’s infantry. Attacking Terry and Corse with Pennington’s brigade dismounted, he assailed Lee’s cavalry with his other two brigades mounted, but Lee held on so obstinately that Custer gained but little ground till our troops, advancing behind the works, drove Corse and Terry out. Then Lee made no further stand except at the west side of the Gillian field, where, assisted by Corse’s brigade, he endeavored to cover the retreat, but just before dark Custer, in concert with some Fifth Corps regiments under Colonel Richardson, drove the last of the enemy westward on the White Oak road.”
http://civilwardailygazette.com/at-the-bayonets-point-the-battle-of-five-forks/

A. Tuesday, April 1, 1862: Raid on Confederate Island No. 10, Tennessee on the Mississippi River. Near New Madrid, Missouri, Commodore Andrew H. Foote, laying siege to Island No. 10, sent a picked force of forty soldiers from the 42nd Indiana Infantry and some sailors in skiffs to the Confederate fortifications on the island, where they landed in the face of a rising electric storm, They managed to surprise and quickly overtake the Confederate guards at the Redan and spiked (made inoperable) 6 large cannon in the Rebel lines, and rowed back across the river just as the storm was whipping up into a frenzy.
Background: On March 31st Beauregard, apparently believing that the position could still be held until it was relieved or at least successfully evacuated, replaced McCown with Maryland native Brig. Gen. William W. MacKall. MacKall was part of Beauregard's anti-Davis clique. A West Pointer and former Lt. Col. in the Regular Army, he had served as Assistant Adjutant General of the Department of the Pacific; hardly a candidate for sacrifice.
MacKall arrived at Madrid Bend and found his new command disheartened, poorly armed and the Confederate gunboats in the vicinity useless. Just before his arrival the Flotilla Brigade under Col. Napoleon Buford had surprised and routed Col. Ed Pickett's Confederate garrison at Union City, Tennessee and severed one important line of communication. To add to those woes, on April 1st a forty-man squad from the flotilla stole down river in skiffs, surprised the sentries at the Redan and spiked the guns. Mackall's best ally was Foote's inaction, but Pope was pressing from every angle.
B. Wednesday, April 1, 1863: Frederick Douglass publishes this editorial by himself about the need for black men to join the Union Army: 1st. You are a man; 2nd. You are an American citizen; 3rd. A third reason why a colored man should enlist is found in the fact that every Negro-hater and slavery-lover in the land regards the arming of Negroes as a calamity and is doing his best to prevent it. 4th. You should enlist to learn the use of arms, to become familiar with the means of securing, protecting and defending your own liberty. 5th. You are a member of a long enslaved and despised race. 6th. Whether you are or are not, entitled to all the rights of citizenship in this country has long been a matter of dispute to your prejudice. 7th. Enlist for your own sake. Decried and derided as you have been and still are, you need an act of this kind by which to recover your own self-respect. 8th. You should enlist because your doing so will be one of the most certain means of preventing the country from drifting back into the whirlpool of Pro-Slavery Compromise at the end of the war, which is now our greatest danger. He who shall witness another Compromise with Slavery in this country will see the free colored man of the North more than ever a victim of the pride, lust, scorn and violence of all classes of white men. . . .Ninth. You should enlist because the war for the Union, whether men so call it or not, is a war for Emancipation.
C. Friday, April 1, 1864: Skirmish at Arkadelphia, Arkansas, as Major General Frederick Steele, headed his force south after dark to assist Major General Nathaniel P. Banks, in the Red River Campaign, in Louisiana. Steele's men had several large skirmishes with Brigadier General William Lewis Cabell 's brigade before going into camp near Hollywood, Arkansas, also known as Spoonville or Witherspoonville Shelby camped at Arkadelphia on the night of April 1 while Cabell camped at Antoine Creek, 18 miles (29 km) west of Arkadelphia.
Background: Steele began a march from Arkadelphia toward the Little Missouri River, 25 miles (40 km) distant, after which his plan was to march to Washington, Arkansas, another 30 miles (48 km) further. Marmaduke learned of Steele's location and ordered Shelby to attack the rear of the Union column while Cabell would go to Antoine to get in front of the Union force and Greene would close in from the south.
D. Saturday, April 1, 1865: Resounding Union Victory at Battle of Five Forks, Virginia. In the spring of 1865, Lt. Gen. Ulysses S. Grant had an opportunity to force Gen. Robert E. Lee's Army of Northern Virginia out of its entrenchments at Petersburg by threatening its last supply line, the South Side Railroad. Grant ordered Maj. Gen. Phil Sheridan and his cavalry to advance on the railroad by way of an important road junction known as Five Forks. Lee countered this move by ordering Maj. Gen. George Pickett with his infantry division and cavalry under Thomas Munford, W.H.F. Lee, and Thomas Rosser to hold the vital crossroads "at all hazards." After discovering the Confederate force, Sheridan secured infantry support from Maj. Gen. Gouverneur K. Warren's Fifth Corps. After briefly stalling the Union advance on March 31, Pickett withdrew his command to Five Forks and fortified his position. The next day, while Sheridan’s cavalry pinned the Confederates in position, the Fifth Corps assaulted the Confederate left flank and rear, turning their position and taking scores of prisoners. Pickett, who was attending a shad bake when the fighting began, was unaware that a battle was underway until it was too late. Sheridan, meanwhile, personally directed the Union attack, often exposing himself to personal danger while rallying the troops. Union Brig. Gen. Frederick Winthrop was killed; “Willie” Pegram, beloved Confederate artillery officer, was mortally wounded. Though the Fifth Corps had performed well, Sheridan was nevertheless dissatisfied Warren's performance during the battle and relieved him of command.
The resounding Union triumph heralded the end of the stalemate outside Petersburg and set the stage for the breakthrough that followed the next day. On April 2, Lee informed Jefferson Davis that Petersburg and Richmond would have to be evacuated. Lee surrendered to Grant only seven days later.

Pictures: 1865-04-01 Battle of Five Forks painting; 1865-04-01 Maj Gen Philip Sheridan at Five Forks; 1864-04-02 This is an original Thomas Nast illustration from the April 2, 1864 edition of Harper's Weekly. The illustration features about a dozen images of April Fool's day pranks. The illustration is captioned, "All Fool's Day", and shows Thomas Nast's distinctive signature in the lower right of the center image.
Some of the pranks illustrated in this 1864 picture include women paying a visit to an older man, with the women wearing beards and moustaches. Another image shows Civil War Soldiers playing April Fool's tricks on one another. In one case, a soldier is seen holding his hand on in front of the binoculars of a friend, and in another case, a sailor is seen holding his hat over the telescope of a friend. In one of the lower images, a young boy can be seen tying a string on the dress of a little girl, and in another image a school teacher is seen with a sign on his back that says "Old Fool". Overall this is an extremely interesting piece of artwork, showing the April Fool's traditions of 1864; union soldiers 1st Arkansas cavalry

1. Monday, April 1, 1861: Abraham Lincoln decided how he would deal with the problem of Fort Sumter. Evacuation of both Fort Sumter and Fort Pickens to deny SC the justification to be privileged under the laws of war to resist an open confrontation.
President Lincoln Dupes the Confederates into Firing on Sumter ©
On Monday, April 1, 1861, Abraham Lincoln decided how he would deal with the problem of Fort Sumter. It was plain that an attempt to enter Charleston Harbor with military force would be recognized the world over as an act of hostility by the United States against South Carolina, that the State would be privileged under the laws of war to resist. It was exactly this outcome that William H. Seward had been adamant in arguing, over the last two weeks, Lincoln should avoid.
Just three days earlier, at a Cabinet meeting, Seward’s policy seemed to be accepted, when General Scott formally opined that both Fort Sumter and Fort Pickens be evacuated. Backing Scott up, Seward had stressed the point that the dispatch of an expedition to Charleston “would provoke an attack and so involve war at that point." Seward had tried to bolster his case with the concession that, while Sumter should be evacuated, Pickens should be held— suggesting that Captain M.C. Meigs could organize an expedition to relieve Pickens.
Lincoln responded, by giving Seward the choice of either having the expedition to Charleston result in a collision of arms, as Lincoln already had Gustavus V. Fox organizing it, or help Lincoln derail it without any one knowing.
Accepting the fact he could not move Lincoln to his view, Seward agreed to participate. Working hand-in-hand now with Seward, Lincoln wrote the following messages on Monday, April 1.
No originals of these messages have come down to us. There are more than one version of some of them, written by different persons. None of the messages in the record are in Lincoln’s hand, but their essential accuracy is confirmed by David D. Porter who received them from Lincoln’s hand and carried them to New York. (Porter does not tell us what he did with the order addressed to him.)
Executive Mansion, April 1, 1861; to Commandant Andrew H. Foote, commanding Brooklyn Navy Yard
Sir: You will fit out the Powhatan without delay. Lieutenant Porter will relieve Captain Mercer in command of her. She is bound for secret service, and you will under no circumstances communicate to the Navy Department the fact that she is putting out. Abraham Lincoln
Executive Mansion, April 1, 1861 to Captain Samuel Mercer, U.S. Navy
Sir: Circumstances render it necessary to place in command of your ship, and for a special purpose, an officer who is duly informed and instructed in relation to the wishes of the Government, and you will therefore consider yourself detached. Abraham Lincoln
Executive Mansion, April 1, 1861 to Lieutenant David D. Porter
Sir: You will proceed to New York, and with the least possible delay assume command of the Powhatan. Proceed to Pensacola Harbor, and at any cost prevent any Confederate expedition from the mainland reaching Fort Pickens. This order, its object, and your destination will be communicated to no person whatever until you reach the harbor of Pensacola. Abraham Lincoln
http://americancivilwar.com/authors/Joseph_Ryan/150-Year-Anniversary/April-1861/What-Happened-in-April-1861.html
2. Tuesday, April 1, 1862: Salem, Virginia - the Union force entered the town of Salem and attacked the Confederate force, commanded by Maj. Gen. Thomas J. Jackson. The Confederates were forced to retreat up the Shenandoah Valley. Jackson used his cavalry, commanded by Col. Turner Ashby, to cover his withdrawal.
https://www.mycivilwar.com/battles/1862s.html
3. Wednesday, April 1, 1863: April 1863 saw the start of the third year of the Great American Civil War. The economic plight of the South was taking a heavy toll. Coupled with this, the Army of the Potomac (US) started to finalize plans for yet another attack on Richmond, the Confederacy's capital. The North’s wartime conscription (draft) law in U.S. goes into effect. Deserters can be shot under this new law. Union troops leave from Jackson, TN on expedition to the Hatchie River, and encounter several skirmishes with Confederates over the next two weeks. Northwest of Washington, DC near the mouth of Broad Run, Loudoun County, VA, Captain John Mosby's (CSA) 65 men are surprised by 200 Union cavalry troopers; Mosby counterattacks, inflicting 107 Federal casualties and again escapes capture.
https://sites.google.com/site/civilwarhardemancotn/departments/department-c/part-one-hundred-three
4. Tuesday, April 1, 1862: On the southern peninsula of Virginia 12,000 Confederate soldiers faced McClellan’s (US) three regiments in total a total 112,000 men. At Island No. 10 on Mississippi River, a small Union raiding party steals six guns from the Confederate hold and escapes without a loss. Things were getting tougher for the South, the people of Richmond were donating the bells of their churches to be melted into cannon.
https://sites.google.com/site/civilwarhardemancotn/departments/department-b/part-fifty-one
5. Wednesday April 1, 1863: First wartime conscription law went into effect in the U.S.
https://thisdayinusmilhist.wordpress.com/2014/4/1/
6. Friday, April 1, 1864: In Louisiana, the Union forces entered the town of Natchitoches. Once there, a small skirmish erupted between the Federals and the Confederate force.
https://sites.google.com/site/civilwarhardemancotn/departments/1864/week-155
7. Friday, April 1, 1864: Natchitoches, Louisiana - the Union force entered the town of Natchitoches. Once there, a small skirmish erupted between the Federals and the Confederate force.
https://www.mycivilwar.com/battles/1864s.html
8. Friday, April 1, 1864: US Army transport USS Maple Leaf, returning from carrying troops to Palatka, Florida, was destroyed by a Confederate torpedo in the St. John's River. She was one of several victims in this river, which Southerners had mined with twelve floating torpedoes, each containing 70 pounds of powder.
https://sites.google.com/site/civilwarhardemancotn/departments/1864/week-155
9. Saturday, April 1, 1865: Worn down by the stresses of his office, Florida Governor John Milton commits suicide at his plantation, Sylvania. Milton was a capable governor who valiantly defended his state and supplied provisions to the Confederacy, but by the end of the war much of Florida was occupied by Union forces and the state’s finances were depleted. Just before his death, Milton addressed the Florida legislature and said that Yankees “have developed a character so odious that death would be preferable to reunion with them.” Milton was 57 when he put a pistol to his head.
https://thisdayinusmilhist.wordpress.com/2014/4/1/

A Tuesday, April 1, 1862: Near New Madrid, Missouri, Commodore Andrew Foote, laying siege to Island No. 10, sends a picked force of soldiers from the 42nd Indiana Infantry and some sailors by rowboat to the Confederate fortifications on the island, where they landed in the face of a rising electric storm and spiked (made inoperable) 6 large cannon in the Rebel lines, and rowed back across the river just as the storm was whipping up into a frenzy. That night, a tornado swept through New Madrid, and swept along the river; it struck Union and Confederate camps and killed several men in each.
http://civilwarsesquicentdaily-wolfshield.blogspot.com/search?q=April+1%2C+1862
A+ Tuesday, April 1, 1862: Island No. 10, Tennessee - a small detachment of Union soldiers took some small boats, quietly traveled on the Mississippi River to Island No. 10, and landed. They managed to quickly overtake the Confederate guards, spiked 6 guns, and returned back to their boats.
https://www.mycivilwar.com/battles/1862s.html
A+ Tuesday, April 1, 1862: On March 31st Beauregard, apparently believing that the position could still be held until it was relieved or at least successfully evacuated, replaced McCown with Maryland native Brig. Gen. William W. MacKall. MacKall was part of Beauregard's anti-Davis clique. A West Pointer and former Lt. Col. in the Regular Army, he had served as Assistant Adjutant General of the Department of the Pacific; hardly a candidate for sacrifice.
MacKall arrived at Madrid Bend and found his new command disheartened, poorly armed and the Confederate gunboats in the vicinity useless. Just before his arrival the Flotilla Brigade under Col. Napoleon Buford had surprised and routed Col. Ed Pickett's Confederate garrison at Union City, Tennessee and severed one important line of communication. To add to those woes, on April 1st a forty-man squad from the flotilla stole down river in skiffs, surprised the sentries at the Redan and spiked the guns. Mackall's best ally was Foote's inaction, but Pope was pressing from every angle.
http://www.civilwarhome.com/newmadriddescrip.html
B Wednesday April 1, 1863: In Douglass’ Monthly, Frederick Douglass publishes this editorial by himself about the need for black men to join the Union Army: “First. You are a man, although a colored man. If you were only a horse or an ox, incapable of deciding whether the rebels are right or wrong, you would have no responsibility, and might like the horse or the ox go on eating your corn or grass, in total indifference, as to which side is victorious or vanquished in this conflict. You are however no horse, and no ox, but a man, and whatever concerns man should interest you. He who looks upon a conflict between right and wrong, and does not help the right against the wrong, despises and insults his own nature, and invites the contempt of mankind. As between the North and South, the North is clearly in the right and the South is flagrantly in the wrong. You should therefore, simply as a matter of right and wrong, give your utmost aid to the North. In presence of such a contest there is no neutrality for any man. . . .
Second. You are however, not only a man, but an American citizen, so declared by the highest legal adviser of the Government, and you have hitherto expressed in various ways, not only your willingness but your earnest desire to fulfil any and every obligation which the relation of citizenship imposes. Indeed, you have hitherto felt wronged and slighted, because while white men of all other nations have been freely enrolled to serve the country, you a native born citizen have been coldly denied the honor of aiding in defense of the land of your birth. . . .
Third. A third reason why a colored man should enlist is found in the fact that every Negro-hater and slavery-lover in the land regards the arming of Negroes as a calamity and is doing his best to prevent it. . . .
Fourth. You should enlist to learn the use of arms, to become familiar with the means of securing, protecting and defending your own liberty. A day may come when men shall learn war no more, when justice shall be so clearly apprehended, so universally practiced, and humanity shall be so profoundly loved and respected, that war and bloodshed shall be confined only to beasts of prey. . . . When it is seen that black men no more than white men can be enslaved with impunity, men will be less inclined to enslave and oppress them. Enlist therefore, that you may learn the art and assert the ability to defend yourself and your race.
Fifth. You are a member of a long enslaved and despised race. Men have set down your submission to Slavery and insult, to a lack of manly courage. They point to this fact as demonstrating your fitness only to be a servile class. You should enlist and disprove the slander, and wipe out the reproach. When you shall be seen nobly defending the liberties of your own country against rebels and traitors— brass itself will blush to use such arguments imputing cowardice against you.
Sixth. Whether you are or are not, entitled to all the rights of citizenship in this country has long been a matter of dispute to your prejudice. By enlisting in the service of your country at this trial hour, and upholding the National Flag, you stop the mouths of traducers and win applause even from the iron lips of ingratitude. Enlist and you make this your country in common with all other men born in the country or out of it.
Seventh. Enlist for your own sake. Decried and derided as you have been and still are, you need an act of this kind by which to recover your own self-respect. You have to some extent rated your value by the estimate of your enemies and hence have counted yourself less than you are. You owe it to yourself and your race to rise from your social debasement. . . .
Eighth. You should enlist because your doing so will be one of the most certain means of preventing the country from drifting back into the whirlpool of Pro-Slavery Compromise at the end of the war, which is now our greatest danger. He who shall witness another Compromise with Slavery in this country will see the free colored man of the North more than ever a victim of the pride, lust, scorn and violence of all classes of white men. . . .
Ninth. You should enlist because the war for the Union, whether men so call it or not, is a war for Emancipation. The salvation of the country, by the inexorable relation of cause and effect, can be secured only by the complete abolition of Slavery. The President has already proclaimed emancipation to the Slaves in the rebel States which is tantamount to declaring Emancipation in all the States, for Slavery must exist everywhere in the South in order to exist anywhere in the South. Can you ask for a more inviting, ennobling and soul enlarging work, than that of making one of the glorious Band who shall carry Liberty to your enslaved people? . . .
When time's ample curtain shall fall upon our national tragedy, and our hillsides and valleys shall neither redden with the blood nor whiten with the bones of kinsmen and countrymen who have fallen in the sanguinary and wicked strife; when grim visage war has smoothed his wrinkled front and our country shall have regained its normal condition as a leader of nations in the occupation and blessings of peace—and history shall record the names of heroes and martyrs who bravely answered the call of patriotism and Liberty—against traitors, thieves and assassins—let it not be said that in the long list of glory, composed of men of all nations—there appears the name of no colored man.
http://civilwarsesquicentdaily-wolfshield.blogspot.com/search?q=April+1%2C+1863
C Friday, April 1, 1864: More skirmishes at Arkadelphia, Arkansas, as Major General Frederick Steele, (US) heads south to assist Major General Nathaniel P. Banks, (US) in the Red River Campaign, in Louisiana.
https://sites.google.com/site/civilwarhardemancotn/departments/1864/week-155
C+ Friday, April 1, 1864: Steele began a march from Arkadelphia toward the Little Missouri River, 25 miles (40 km) distant, after which his plan was to march to Washington, Arkansas, another 30 miles (48 km) further. Marmaduke learned of Steele's location and ordered Shelby to attack the rear of the Union column while Cabell would go to Antoine to get in front of the Union force and Greene would close in from the south.
After leaving Arkadelphia, before dark on April 1, Steele's men had several large skirmishes with Cabell's brigade before going into camp near Hollywood, Arkansas, also known as Spoonville or Witherspoonville Shelby camped at Arkadelphia on the night of April 1 while Cabell camped at Antoine Creek, 18 miles (29 km) west of Arkadelphia.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skirmish_at_Terre_Noire_Creek
Saturday, April 1, 1865: Battle of Five Forks: George Pickett [CS] could not withstand the federal envelopment move around Petersburg that began here.
http://blueandgraytrail.com/year/186504
Saturday, April 1, 1865: At the Battle of Five Forks, Virginia, Major General Sheridan’s Cavalry and Major General Warren’s forces, attack and overwhelm and separate Major General George E. Pickett (CSA) from the rest of the Army of Northern Virginia (CSA) almost completely surrounding Petersburg in the process. The Union suffered 1,000 casualties, but nearly 5,000 of Pickett’s men were killed, wounded, or captured. Near Selma, Alabama, General Forrest outnumbered and outgunned, his Confederates fought bravely for more than an hour as more Union cavalry and artillery are deployed on the field. Forrest himself is wounded by a saber-wielding Union captain; whom he kills with his revolver. Finally, a Union cavalry charge with carbines blazing broke the Confederate militia causing Forrest to be flanked on his right. He is forced to Selma, Alabama in retreat under severe pressure.
https://sites.google.com/site/civilwarhardemancotn/departments/1865/week-207
D Saturday, April 1, 1865: Battle of Five Forks. In the spring of 1865, Lt. Gen. Ulysses S. Grant had an opportunity to force Gen. Robert E. Lee's Army of Northern Virginia out of its entrenchments at Petersburg by threatening its last supply line, the South Side Railroad. Grant ordered Maj. Gen. Phil Sheridan and his cavalry to advance on the railroad by way of an important road junction known as Five Forks. Lee countered this move by ordering Maj. Gen. George Pickett with his infantry division and cavalry under Thomas Munford, W.H.F. Lee, and Thomas Rosser to hold the vital crossroads "at all hazards." After discovering the Confederate force, Sheridan secured infantry support from Maj. Gen. Gouverneur K. Warren's Fifth Corps. After briefly stalling the Union advance on March 31, Pickett withdrew his command to Five Forks and fortified his position. The next day, while Sheridan’s cavalry pinned the Confederates in position, the Fifth Corps assaulted the Confederate left flank and rear, turning their position and taking scores of prisoners. Pickett, who was attending a shad bake when the fighting began, was unaware that a battle was underway until it was too late. Sheridan, meanwhile, personally directed the Union attack, often exposing himself to personal danger while rallying the troops. Union Brig. Gen. Frederick Winthrop was killed; “Willie” Pegram, beloved Confederate artillery officer, was mortally wounded. Though the Fifth Corps had performed well, Sheridan was nevertheless dissatisfied Warren's performance during the battle and relieved him of command.
The resounding Union triumph heralded the end of the stalemate outside Petersburg and set the stage for the breakthrough that followed the next day. On April 2, Lee informed Jefferson Davis that Petersburg and Richmond would have to be evacuated. Lee surrendered to Grant only seven days later.
http://www.civilwar.org/battlefields/five-forks.html
D+ Saturday, April 1, 1865: Confederate General Robert E. Lee’s supply line into Petersburg, Virginia, is closed when Union forces under General Ulysses S. Grant collapse the end of Lee’s lines around Petersburg. The Confederates suffer heavy casualties, and the battle triggered Lee’s retreat from Petersburg as the two armies began a race that would end a week later at Appomattox Court House. For nearly a year, Grant had laid siege to Lee’s army in an elaborate network of trenches that ran from Petersburg to the Confederate capital at Richmond, 25 miles north. Lee’s hungry army slowly dwindled through the winter of 1864-65 as Grant’s army swelled with well-fed reinforcements. On March 25, Lee attacked part of the Union trenches at Fort Stedman in a desperate attempt to break the siege and split Grant’s force. When that attack failed, Grant began mobilizing his forces along the entire 40-mile front. Southwest of Petersburg, Grant sent General Philip Sheridan against Lee’s right flank. Sheridan moved forward on March 31, but the tough Confederates halted his advance. Sheridan moved troops to cut the railroad that ran from the southwest into Petersburg, but the focus of the battle became Five Forks, a road intersection that provided the key to Lee’s supply line. Lee instructed his commander there, General George Pickett, to “Hold Five Forks at all hazards.” On April 1, Sheridan’s men slammed into Pickett’s troops. Pickett had his force poorly positioned, and he was taking a long lunch with his staff when the attack occurred. General Gouverneur K. Warren’s V Corps supported Sheridan, and the 27,000 Yankee troops soon crushed Pickett’s command of 10,000. The Union lost 1,000 casualties, but nearly 5,000 of Pickett’s men were killed, wounded, or captured. During the battle, Sheridan, with the approval of Grant, removed Warren from command despite Warren’s effective deployment of his troops. It appears that a long-simmering feud between the two was the cause, but Warren was not officially cleared of any wrongdoing by a court of inquiry until 1882. The vital intersection was in Union hands, and Lee’s supply line was cut. Grant now attacked all along the Petersburg-Richmond front and Lee evacuated the cities. The two armies began a race west, but Lee could not outrun Grant. The Confederate leader surrendered at Appomattox Court House on April 9.
https://thisdayinusmilhist.wordpress.com/2014/4/1/
Saturday, April 1, 1865: At the bayonet’s point’ – The Battle of Five Forks “General Philip Sheridan, holding the Union left, had it pretty hot the previous day. While the Fifth Corps was tangled in the mire and confusion to his right, George Pickett’s Confederates attacked him, pushing him all the way from Five Forks to where he stood now – Dinwiddie Court House. And just as the Rebels were about to launch a final attack at dusk to flatten Sheridan, the Federals were reinforced and the Virginian thought better.
The night for everyone but Sheridan was full of mishap and misunderstanding. All he wanted was for the Fifth Corps to back him up, and for reasons great and small this didn’t happen as hoped. In truth, Sheridan had petitioned Grant for use of the Sixth Corps, having little faith in Gouverneur K. Warren, but that simply wasn’t happening.
Come dawn, Warren’s mishaps were unknown to Sheridan. Figuring that General Warren’s Fifth Corps would soon appear on the enemy’s left, he ordered the brigades of George Custer and Thomas Devin forward. For a time, the pushed them back, their eyes to the Confederate left hoping to see masses of blue forming in the mists. The Sheridan figured that Warren would use was Crump Road, running across Gravelly Run and by the J. Boisseau house.
But as Sheridan’s host pushed the men of Pickett northward along the road to Five Forks, they did not materialize. To and even beyond Crump Road, leading in on his right, there was nothing.
“But they did not reach there till after the enemy had got by,” penned Sheridan after the war. “As a matter of fact, when Pickett was passing the all-important point Warren’s men were just breaking from the bivouac in which their chief had placed them the night before…”
They were, however, on their way, though much later than Sheridan would have liked. He was first enjoined by Romeyn Ayres’ division, which used a more southerly road, marching at Sheridan’s troops from behind. When Warren’s other two divisions, those of Charles Griffin and Samuel Crawford, finally made their appearance, Sheridan formed the entire Fifth Corps at the J. Boisseau house to rest and wait for Warren himself to arrive.
“That we had accomplished nothing but to oblige our foe to retreat was to me bitterly disappointing,” Sheridan continued, “but still feeling sure that he would not give up the Five Forks crossroads without a fight, I pressed him back there with [Wesley] Merritt’s cavalry, Custer advancing on the Scott road, while Devin drove the rearguard along that leading from J. Boisseau’s to Five Forks.”
For the rest of the morning, across the meridian, and two hours after, Sheridan’s troopers drove the Rebels slowly back into their own entrenchments at Five Forks. And here the Rebels stood, 10,000-strong and desperate, names such as Ransom, Fitz Lee, Rosser and Pickett to hold the Confederate left.
“I felt certain the enemy would fight at Five Forks—he had to,” Sheridan recalled, “so, while we were getting up to his intrenchments, I decided on my plan of battle.”
The Confederate front was to be assailed by two divisions of dismounted cavalry under Merritt, while still more feigned an attack on Pickett’s right, while the actual assault would be launched by the entire Fifth Corps upon the enemy’s left. If accomplished, Pickett would be fully isolated from the rest of General Lee’s Army of Northern Virginia.
When Gouverneur Warren managed to get himself to Sheridan’s side, the latter told the former the plan, explaining just how Pickett’s men were posted, and explaining precisely how he wished for them to make the attack. Sheridan had been gifted by Grant the right to relieve General Warren of his post at the head of the Fifth Corps. Not wanting to do this on the very eve of battle, however, Sheridan demurred as all seemed well enough.
“General Warren seemed to understand me clearly,” Sheridan wrote, “and then left to join his command, while I turned my attention to the cavalry, instructing Merritt to begin by making demonstrations as though to turn the enemy’s right, and to assault the front of the works with his dismounted cavalry as soon as Warren became engaged.”
After his own affairs were in order, Sheridan rode to find the Fifth Corps, which was again moving much more slowly than he had hoped.
“I was disappointed that more of the corps was not already up, and as the precious minutes went by without any apparent effort to hurry the troops on to the field, this disappointment grew into disgust. At last I expressed to Warren my fears that the cavalry might expend all their ammunition before the attack could be made, that the sun would go down before the battle could be begun, or that troops from Lee’s right, which, be it remembered, was less than three miles away from my right, might, by striking my rear, or even by threatening it, prevent the attack on Pickett.
“Warren did not seem to me to be at all solicitous; his manner exhibited decided apathy, and he remarked with indifference that “Bobby Lee was always getting people into trouble.” With unconcern such as this, it is no wonder that fully three hours’ time was consumed in marching his corps from J. Boisseau’s to Gravelly Run Church, though the distance was but two miles. However, when my patience was almost worn out, Warren reported his troops ready, Ayres’s division being formed on the west side of the Gravelly Church road, Crawford’s on the east side, and Griffin in reserve behind the right of Crawford, a little different from my instructions. The corps had no artillery present, its batteries, on account of the mud, being still north of Gravelly Run. Meanwhile Merritt had been busy working his men close up to the intrenchments from the angle of the return west, along the White Oak road.” – Philip Sheridan
Sheridan was not pleased at all with Warren’s formation, and Warren, writing after the war, would debate over the wording of said order. Additionally, Warren contested Sheridan’s knowledge of how long it took a corps of infantry to get into position. But finally, at 4pm, the Fifth Corps was ready to attack, and they stepped off.
“After the forward movement began,” related Warren in his official report, “a few minutes brought us to the White Oak road, distant about 1,000 yards. There we found the advance of General Mackenzie’s cavalry, which, coming up the White Oak road, had arrived there just before us. This showed us for the first time that we were too far to our right of the enemy’s left flank.” With frustration, Warren realigned his men, so as to bring his line on Pickett’s left.
“Fortunately for us,” Warren continued, “the enemy’s left flank so rested in the woods that he could not fire at us as we crossed this open field, and the part of it that face us formed a very short line. This General Ayres attacked at once, the firing being heavy, but less than usually destructive, on account of the thick woods. The rapid change of front by General Ayres caused his right flank to first get in advance of General Crawford’s, owing to the greater distance the latter had to move, and exposed the former to being taken in flank by the enemy.”
This was a mess.
By Sheridan’s original orders (as related by Sheridan), he wanted Ayres and Crawford to attack the Rebel flank squarely and together. What Warren was doing was as tangled as the night previous. The situation slid into disarray when Crawford’s entire division became isolated from the rest of Warren’s line, drawing Griffin’s Division along with it. “The deflection of this division on a line of march,” Sheridan wrote, “frustrated the purpose I had in mind when ordering the attack, and caused a gap between Ayres and Crawford, of which the enemy quickly took advantage, and succeeded in throwing a part of Ayres’s division into confusion. At this juncture I sent word to General Warren to have Crawford recalled; for the direction he was following was not only a mistaken one, but, in case the assault at the return failed, he ran great risk of capture.”
But nobody could find Warren. Sheridan then sent for Griffin, who had seen Crawford’s mistake and was doing his best to pull his own division out of the debacle. Even before Sheridan’s staff could find him, Griffin accomplished this and more, joining Ayres. This was, perhaps, not as pretty as Sheridan would have liked, but it was enough.
“After this change of front,” recorded Ayres in his report, “the troops were pushed forward and soon came upon the left flank of the enemy, which was thrown back at right angles with his main line and covered by a strong breast-work, screened behind a dense undergrowth of pine and about 100 yards in length. This breast-work my troops charged and took at the bayonet’s point, capturing in carrying it over 1,000 prisoners and several battle-flags.”
Sheridan added: “When Ayres’s division went over the flank of the enemy’s works, Devin’s division of cavalry, which had been assaulting the front, went over in company with it; and hardly halting to reform, the intermingling infantry and dismounted cavalry swept down inside the intrenchments, pushing to and beyond Five Forks, capturing thousands of prisoners. The only stand the enemy tried to make was when he attempted to form near the Ford road. Griffin pressed him so hard there, however, that he had to give way in short order, and many of his men, with three pieces of artillery, fell into the hands of Crawford while on his circuitous march.
“The right of Custer’s division gained a foothold on the enemy’s works simultaneously with Devin’s, but on the extreme left Custer had a very severe combat with W. H. F. Lee’s cavalry, as well as with Corse’s and Terry’s infantry. Attacking Terry and Corse with Pennington’s brigade dismounted, he assailed Lee’s cavalry with his other two brigades mounted, but Lee held on so obstinately that Custer gained but little ground till our troops, advancing behind the works, drove Corse and Terry out. Then Lee made no further stand except at the west side of the Gillian field, where, assisted by Corse’s brigade, he endeavored to cover the retreat, but just before dark Custer, in concert with some Fifth Corps regiments under Colonel Richardson, drove the last of the enemy westward on the White Oak road.”
That day was Sheridan’s, no thanks to Warren. Sheridan had never wanted the Fifth Corps, and used it because he had no other choice. Now that the battle was at its end, Sheridan felt it “necessary to protect myself in this critical situation, and General Warren having sorely disappointed me, both in the moving of his corps and in its management during the battle, I felt that he was not the man to rely upon under such circumstances, and deeming that it was to the best interest of the service as well as but just to myself, I relieved him, ordering him to report to General Grant.”
According to Warren, “General Sheridan gave no reason for this order of his, but I at once set out to obey it, reaching General Grant about midnight.”
Grant had been troubled by Warren’s performance over the past couple of days, and was worried he’d fail Sheridan. He had written to Sheridan explaining, “as much as I liked General Warren, now was not a time when we could let our personal feelings for any one stand in the way of success; and if his removal was necessary to success, not to hesitate.”
Warren’s generalship was described by Grant after the war: “He was a man of fine intelligence, great earnestness, quick perception, and could make his dispositions as quickly as any officer, under difficulties where he was forced to act. But I had before discovered a defect which was beyond his control, that was very prejudicial to his usefulness in emergencies like the one just before us. He could see every danger at a glance before he had encountered it. He would not only make preparations to meet the danger which might occur, but he would inform his commanding officer what others should do while he was executing his move.”
And so, with General Lee’s left at Five Forks crumbled, Grant issued orders for an assault upon the Petersburg lines themselves for the predawn of the next morning. He had wanted to make a night assault, but his corps commanders thought it a poor idea as it was too dark for such an important move. Grant ultimately agreed, but “kept up a continuous artillery fire upon the enemy around the whole line including that north of the James River, until it was light enough to move, which was about a quarter to five in the morning.” [1]
The next morning, George Pickett would be found along the Appomattox River in command of only 800 men, the rest killed, captured or scattered to the winds.
[1] Sources: Official Records, Series 1, Vol. 46, Part 1, p828, 830-836; Memoirs by Philip Sheridan; Memoirs by Ulysses S. Grant.”
http://civilwardailygazette.com/at-the-bayonets-point-the-battle-of-five-forks/
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Good morning and thanks for my morning read with a good cup of coffee.

I would go with 1 April 1865 for it set into motion the surrender of the Confederate's premiere field army in addition to its finest general who was also its General-in-chief - General Robert E. Lee. Plus, I add that I appreciate your return of submitting such vibrant histories over the course of the Civil War. It is a job well done, LTC Stephen F. , and much appreciated!