Grant contemplated his next move. Upton had broken through the Confederate line with 4,500 men (12 regiments). His initial success was undermined by poor coordination and timing. Warren had moved too soon on the right. Upton’s tardiness in getting underway became a problem when Mott’s division, his supporting unit, moved forward on time. With no support and no reinforcement Upton was driven back out of the Mule Shoe Salient. Grant planned to try again, this time with a whole corps. Which corps and who would command would be an easy decision. Warren and Burnside had performed poorly in the Wilderness and the first fews days at Spotsylvania, and Wright had been a corps commander for only two days. That left Hancock and the II Corps. Hancock was clearly the best corps commander he had. Hancock’s Corps was on the far right and would have to be moved behind the lines to the left. Hancock would form his lines on the John Brown farm about three quarters of a mile away and like Upton strike the salient. The Brown House was located one-half mile to the left of the sign below.

After Hancock punched a hole in Lee’s line they were to widen the breach allowing Wright’s VI Corps to join the fray. Warren on the right and Burnside on the left were expected to attack simultaneously with the goal of holding the forces in front of them in place. Hancock’s 20,000 men were divided into four divisions commanded by John Gibbon, David Birney, Francis Barlow and Gershom Mott. The Federals would advance in a tight formation with a two-division front to attack the tip of the Mule Shoe.

On the 11th Lee knew that something was going on but was not quite sure what. That day Grant had ordered a reconnaissance in force against Lee’s left led by Colonel Nelson Miles. Lee countered by moving two brigades from Jubal Early’s Third Corps from the right to the left of his line. Grant also ordered Burnside to adjust his poorly deployed lines. This combined with other reports that Burnside’s wagons were on the move and the fact that his left flank was exposed convinced Lee that the Federal move on his left was a feint and that Grant was going to either withdraw to Fredericksburg or move around his right toward Richmond as he had done at the Wilderness. Either way Lee wanted to strike the Federal column while it was in motion. In preparation he began withdrawing units toward the Court House crossroads. Because the cannon at the Mule Shoe would have the furthest to travel he withdrew 30 guns there starting in the late afternoon. Strangely, he did not communicate his plan to his corps commander at the Mule Shoe, Major General Richard Ewell, or the division commander there, Major General Edward “Allegheny” Johnson. Johnson only became aware of the situation when he received a panicked dispatch from his subordinate, Brigadier General George Steuart, that his guns were being withdrawn. Johnson quickly informed Ewell, who sent word to Lee to return the guns. By now it was evening and it would take some time for them to make their way back. For someone who excelled at predicting the moves of his adversaries this was a huge miscalculation by Lee. He was removing guns from the very place where the Union attack would take place.

After darkness fell at 9:00 PM Hancock’s Corps moved out in the pouring rain not knowing where they were headed. They were marching away from the enemy to Brown’s Farm. Hancock met with his division commanders before 4:30 AM near the center of the line where the 20th IN was located. They would be the guiding regiment. At 4:35 AM the men headed toward the Mule Shoe. The 66th NY and the 1st and 2nd US Sharpshooters were at the head of the column as skirmishers. Barlow was to the left and Birney to the right, as shown in the map below. Mott followed Birney, and Gibbon’s men would act as the reserve. They encountered Confederate pickets along the Landrum farm lane who fled to warn their comrades. As the men moved over a ridge near Landrum’s Farm Lane and on to the sunken lane, they mistook this area for the salient and let out a large yell which also alerted the Confederates to their presence. They quickly realized their error and charged toward the salient.

The 26th MI planted their colors on the salient’s earthworks at 4:50 AM followed shortly by the 140th PA both from Colonel Miles brigade of Barlow’s division. They struck the Confederate line first where Colonel William Witcher’s brigade was placed, see map above. Witcher’s brigade fell first followed by Steuart. “Allegheny” Johnson rushed to the front from his headquarters at the McCoull house. Johnson and his staff had slept in their clothes that night. He had his men on alert for a possible attack and ordered them to be up and in the trenches an hour before daylight but that still could not stem the tide of the overwhelming number of Federals. The Louisiana Brigade under Colonel Zebulon York fell next, followed by the Stonewall Brigade commanded by James Walker who was wounded. The guns that were withdrawn were finally returning but most arrived just in time to be captured. In only thirty minutes a half-mile wide gap was opened in the salient, 3,000 of the 4,500 men in “Allegheny” Johnson’s division were taken prisoner including Generals Johnson and Steuart, and about 20 cannon and thirty stands of colors were captured. But Lane on the eastern base of the Mule Shoe repulsed Burnside and stopped the blue wave there as did Junius Daniels brigade on the western side. The Federals made it about a half mile into the salient but by this time their lines were becoming increasingly disorganized, and command structure was breaking down. This was the major weakness of Grant’s strategy. He had designed an excellent plan to rupture the salient and move into it but what were his men supposed to do next? In the absence of strong leadership at the front things unraveled. Grant, Meade and Hancock were well behind the lines. Hancock would not move his headquarters forward to the Landrum house until 7:00 AM. Wright, whose corps was to support the breakthrough, would eventually be close to the front but he was injured shortly after arriving there and was drinking to dull the pain. For the Confederates at this point the plan was more straightforward. Stop the breakthrough at the eastern and western bases of the salient and then push the Federals out from there.

Brigadier General John Brown Gordon, recently elevated to division command in Ewell’s Corps, and Lee had set up a reserve line prior to the battle between the McCoull and Harrison houses that was occupied by Colonel John Hoffman’s men. Gordon began to organize a counterattack. Gordon sent Robert Johnston’s brigade forward toward the eastern wall of the salient. Johnston was soon wounded, his second in command Thomas Garrett was killed shortly after that and Colonel Thomas Toon assumed command in the intense fighting. Three regiments of Evans’ regiment were sent to the western wall. Gordon then rode back to the reserve line and was organizing Hoffman’s five VA brigades and Evans’ remaining three GA brigades into line when General Lee rode up. Gordon concerned that Lee might try to lead the men forward grabbed Traveller’s bridle as the men shouted “Lee to the rear.” Gordon sent Hoffman and Evans toward the eastern wall as well, see map below. Lee was escorted to the rear by a sergeant from the 49th VA.

Lee had made an enormous blunder stripping men and cannons out of the salient to try and catch Grant on the move. Grant had moved, not away from Lee’s army, but straight at it. Lee now needed to fix his mistake. He realized the salient was a lost cause and instructed his chief engineer, Martin Luther Smith, to construct a new line, using “Allegheny” Johnson’s division as laborers, across the base of the salient eliminating it. Lee would now feed as many men as possible into the Mule Shoe to keep the Federals at bay long enough for the new line to be created. On the Union left Burnside was managing to hold most of the Confederate Third Corps in place but on the Union right Warren was doing nothing and would continue to do nothing for another four hours, allowing Lee to move men from his left into the Mule Shoe. Gordon and his three brigades continued forward toward the east wall of the salient pushing the Federals back (Nelson Miles, John Brook and Thomas Smyth). Given Warren’s inactivity Lee was able to move the two brigades he had removed from the eastern base of the salient the day before, Edward Thomas and Alfred Scales, back to their original locations. Together the reinforcements combined with James Lane’s brigade drove Colonel Simon Griffin’s brigade of Burnside’s IX Corps out of the salient securing the eastern wall.

Along the western wall Brigadier General Cullen Battle’s brigade joined the fight, shown in the map above. In combination with Daniel’s brigade and Evan’s three regiments they began to push the Federals north up the eastern wall. Daniel was mortally wounded during this part of the battle. Stephen Ramseur’s brigade captured a reserve line of earthworks and from there moved north where Ramseur was wounded and knocked out of the fight. The Confederates were within about 300 yards of the tip of the Mule Shoe by about 8:00 AM, shown in the map below.

As Lee was funneling men into position, while others were retreating, he witnessed concerning behavior from his Second Corps commander Richard Ewell. Ewell was berating and mocking Johnson’s men as they were falling back to the rear. He beat some of them with his sword. Lee admonished Ewell for his lack of self-control, asking him how he expected to control his men when he couldn’t control himself. This was the beginning of the end for Ewell in the Army of Northern Virginia. When the opportunity presented itself, Lee would replace him as Corps commander. Lee would next reinforce the western wall of the salient with Confederate Brigadier General Abner Perrin’s brigade who had moved forward into the reserve line. As Perrin moved his men north out of the works he was shot seven times and killed. Perrin’s brigade was followed by Brigadier General Nathaniel Harris’ men and Brigadier General Samuel McGowan’s 1400-man brigade of South Carolinians. McGowan was quickly wounded. His senior colonel Benjamin Brockman was killed shortly thereafter, as was Colonel Brockman’s brother Captain Jesse Brockman. Command fell to Colonel Joseph Brown.

Hancock was funneling in reinforcements as well from the VI Corps division of Thomas Neill, shown in the map below. The brigades of Brigadier General Frank Wheaton, Colonel Daniel Bidwell and Colonel Oliver Edwards arrived along the western wall but were repulsed. Fighting raged with men literally within feet of each other on opposite sides of the western wall of the salient. The Federals called for more reinforcements and Colonel John Brooke’s brigade was sent along with Colonel Lewis Grant’s brigade of Vermonters. Around 9:30 AM Brigadier General David Russell’s First Division of Wright’s VI Corps joined the battle. The division included the brigade of the recently promoted Emory Upton. They were repulsed as well.

Because of the nature of the topography as more Federal troops were added to the battle they kept stacking up at the angle of the western wall. The men were moving southwest down a large ravine past the tip of the salient to the western wall toward what would come to be called the “Bloody Angle”. I shot the next two images to try and illustrate the swale which is hard to do with the overgrown vegetation in summer. In the first image I am looking north. The Landrum Farm Lane is at the base of the tree line running right to left. The Landrum house would be off the picture to the right. You can see the swale just below the tree line, at the base of the ridge. The men were entering the swale on the right side of the image and headed toward the tree to the left. You can also see the ridge that would be to their right as they did so funneling them toward the tree.

In the next picture below, the landmark here is the white 126th Ohio monument on the western part of the field (the small white dot to the left of the tree in the center). The men would be funneling through the swale past the two trees in the center to the left of the monument toward the “Bloody Angle”. They would be headed right toward the “Bloody Angle, Crowded Ravine” sign on the western side of the battlefield. It’s hard to show in the pictures but is very obvious when you walk the Bloody Angle Walking Tour Path in person. This funneling effect directed too many men to a small area on the battlefield causing a logjam effect at the salient.

The image below was taken from the Bloody Angle, Crowded Ravine Sign looking at the swale shown in the previous two pictures. The three trees in the center of the image are in the swale.

The Federals moved up two cannons commanded by Lieutenant Richard Metcalf of the 5th US Artillery to fire double loads of canister at the angle. Between them they fired 23 rounds before all the horses and all but two of the men manning the guns were killed. Hancock had also positioned 30 guns on the Landrum farm lane. The rifle fire at the angle was so intense that a 22-inch oak tree was chopped down by the gunfire injuring several members of the 1st SC when it fell.

Grant pushed Burnside to attack more vigorously around 2:00 PM at Heth’s Salient which was a mile southeast of the tip of the Mule Shoe. Burnside organized elements of two divisions for the attack. However, Lee always looking for a way to fight on the offensive had planned his own attack on Burnside. He would send two brigades, Brigadier General James Lane’s North Carolina Brigade and Mahone’s Brigade commanded by Colonel David Weisiger, circling to the right to strike Burnside’s men on the left flank, shown on the map below. In the bloody hand-to-hand fighting that followed, the 17th MI, the regiment on the Union far left, lost its national colors and 189 of the 225 men it carried into battle. Three soldiers from the 17th MI later received the Medal of Honor for actions on this day including: Private Frederick Alber (awarded on July 30, 1896, for rescuing Lieutenant Charles H. Todd of his regiment who had been captured by a party of Confederates by shooting down one, knocking over another with the butt of his musket, and taking them both prisoners); Sergeant Daniel McFall (awarded on July 27, 1896, for capturing Colonel Barker, commanding the Confederate brigade that charged the Union batteries and on the same day rescued Lieutenant George W. Harmon of his regiment from the enemy); and Sergeant Charles Thompson (awarded on July 27, 1896, who after the regiment was surrounded and all resistance seemed useless, fought singlehanded for the colors and refused to give them up until he had appealed to his superior officers).

On the Union right Warren purposely delayed launching a diversionary assault believing that another attack on Laurel Hill was pointless. Only when threatened with removal did he comply with his orders and then only halfheartedly. Grant then moved Brigadier General Cutler and Griffin’s divisions from Laurel Hill to the Bloody Angle to aid Wright. Cutler’s men arrived a little after 3:00 PM but Wright misunderstood Grant’s order and deployed them in the wrong location. When Romeyn Ayers and Jacob Sweitzer’s brigades from Griffin’s division arrived around 5:00 PM the inexperienced and impaired Wright chose not to use them. After darkness fell the Union pulled back several of their units from along the wall of the salient. After 22 hours of fighting, most of it in the pouring rain, around 3:00 AM Lee sent orders forward for his men to slowly withdraw. The new line of earthworks had been completed. As the sun came up the Confederates were gone from the salient back in what would come to be known as “Lee’s Last Line”, shown in the lower half of the map below.

The fighting at the Mule Shoe had resulting in terrible losses on both sides with the Federals suffering about 9,000 casualties and the Confederates 8,000. Once again Grant failed in his attempt to break the Confederate line. In some ways the end result of the day’s fighting put Lee in a better position than when the day began. He knew the Mule Shoe was a liability but decided not to change it even after Upton’s failed assault. Grant once again witnessed the dysfunction in his corps commanders. The slow and unaggressive Burnside, the recalcitrant Warren, and the inexperienced Wright all disappointed, forcing Grant to rely on Hancock, whose men paid a high price for their commander’s competence. Lee on the other hand managed to recover from his miscalculation of Grant’s intentions but his men also paid a high price in the process of giving him the time he needed to fix his mistake.

Next- A Lot of Maneuvering in the Rain and Mud with Very Little Fighting- May 13-17