Official Records of the Rebellion

THE SIEGE OF RICHMOND.

The siege of Richmond may very properly date from the time at which headquarters camp was established at New Bridge. By the closing days of May the left wing of the Army of the Potomac had advanced along the railroad toward Richmond to beyond Fair Oaks. It was concealed in the dense woods, and held the swampy and uncomfortable ground on the south side of the Chickahominy. Its advanced pickets were just in view of great cleared fields and high grounds, which, if attained, would bring them almost within range of Richmond and in healthy encampments. The right of the army was stretched along the northern banks of the Chickahominy from Bottoms Bridge to beyond Mechanicsville. There were bridges at Bottom’s Bridge, at the railroad crossing, at a point above the railroad—a corduroy structure, known as Sumner’s [243] Bridge—and three bridges nearly completed; one at, one above, and one below the location of New Bridge. The open country mentioned as in front of the left wing reached to the bridges at New Bridge, and here were large fields on both the north and south sides of the Chickahominy.

The corps of Generals Heintzelman and Keyes occupied the southern side of the river. The northern side was held by the corps of Generals Sumner, Hooker, and Franklin.

The signal party serving on the south side of the river, under Lieut. H. L. Johnson, Fifth Connecticut Volunteers, and acting signal officer, had been working faithfully under most disadvantageous circumstances. They were shut in everywhere by swamps and thick woods; there were no points from which they could communicate to advantage; the army was new; the generals did not know how to employ signal officers, and the officers had yet to gain by service experience as to the best modes in which to employ themselves. There were, however, signal stations along the railroad, connecting General Heintzelman’s headquarters at Savage Station with the front beyond Fair Oaks, and the officers had reconnoitered faithfully, but with little success, along the picket line for points of observation.

On the northern side of the Chickahominy the field telegraph line was extended along fences and in trees from general headquarters to near Mechanicsville. The soldiers had ceased to cut the wires, patrols had been established, and the line was working successfully and with little interruption.

There was a station of observation near Mechanicsville, and the station near Hogan’s house, above New Bridge, which had been occupied from the time the advance of the army reached it. From this station could be seen the line of thick woods in which we knew the left of the army lay covered; but though it was scanned carefully every day, and often with glasses, no friendly soldier was visible.

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