Wilderness to Petersburg Campaign
Wilderness to Petersburg Campaign (1864).On 4 May 1864, Lt. Gen. Ulysses S. Grant initiated a campaign with the Union's Army of the Potomac to defeat Gen. Robert E. Lee and the Confederate's Army of Northern Virginia. For forty days, Grant hammered and maneuvered. Lee deftly fended off Grant's force, which was double his own. The series of battles, from the Battle of the Wilderness to the siege of Petersburg, was called the “Overland Campaign” to distinguish it from Maj. Gen. George B. McClellan's Peninsular Campaign (Seven Days' Battle), in 1862, which had involved an approach by water. The Overland Campaign cost 60,000 Union casualties and perhaps 35,000 Confederate losses. Strategically, it was a Union success, ending in June with...
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