Big Bang Goes Bust

 

   Teresa and I made our way down to Richmond, Virginia last weekend to join what's called a staff ride. Military officers used to ride horses around old battlefields to review strategy and tactics. My cousin Tom teaches at a school for strategic studies in Washington and uses these staff rides (without horses) as a teaching tool. A few years ago he started doing these rides for friends and family.

  For this most recent tour we joined about 35 participants in Richmond on Friday afternoon. Many of us have been on previous rides to Gettysburg, Antietam, etc. and we got reacquainted at an Irish pub. Saturday morning we drove 20 miles northeast to the Cold Harbor Battlefield Visitor Center. Back in 1864 Grant had been chasing Lee, trying to get around him and capture Richmond. The two armies met a crossroads called Cold Harbor  

   Cold Harbor was a disaster for Grant and the thousands of Union soldiers who died there in less than an hour. We staff ride participants are given the opportunity to take the role of one of the generals in the battle. Tom gives the participants readings beforehand, then peppers his student with embarrassing questions. The other participants are invited to follow up the attack. It is good to use humor to diffuse the attack. 

   My brother-in-law Sunny was General Grant. As he began his presentation, Sunny pulled out a fat cigar, followed by a bottle of whiskey which he chugged down. We learned later that Grant only drank when he was lonely, so his subordinates made sure he always had plenty of company, including his wife Julia, who would join him when the shooting died down.

   After his fiasco at Cold Harbor Grant tried another ploy. He sent part of his army down to Petersburg 30 miles south of Richmond. Petersburg was the supply hub for Richmond. If Petersburg could be taken, Lee's army would be done for and the war would potentially be over. The commander of the army going to Petersburg was General William F. Smith, nicknamed 'Baldy.'

   I had the role of Baldy. I requested that my friend Jim, who is a lawyer, assist me in the defense of the indefensible General Smith. Petersburg was lightly defended by Confederates, many of who were boys and soldiers recovering from wounds. Baldy could easily have swept over them and taken Petersburg. But General Smith was an engineer at heart and he liked to have everything just right before attacking. Also, just days earlier, he had seen hundreds of his men mowed down in the attack at Cold Harbor. By the time Smith made his attack, Lee had gotten his army down to Petersburg and the town was safe.

   Tom made Jim and I sweat and the other participants were relentless. We took full responsibility and Tom called a cease fire for lunch. After lunch the siege began. Both sides realized the futility of attacking entrenched lines and settled down to sniping at each other. After a few weeks of this, a former miner in a Pennsylvania regiment had the idea of tunneling under the massive Confederate lines and blowing a hole in the defenses. Before the Confederates recovered, the Union soldiers could pour through the gap and outflank their enemy. The war could be over in an hour.

   The Pennsylvania regiment mentioned above was composed almost entirely of coal miners, who were enthusiastic about having something to do. Their commander was Lt. Col. Henry Pleasants. My brother Steve took the role of Colonel Pleasants and he did a dandy job. It took the soldiers about a month to dig the 500 foot tunnel to a point where the Confederates had set up several cannons. A large room was dug out at the far end of the tunnel and packed with four tons of explosives.

   The longest fuse available was only 40 feet long, so two fuses were spliced together. The fuse was lit at 3:30 a.m. Four Union regiments waited for the explosion after which they would attack. But the explosion did not come. Two brave volunteers entered the tunnel and discovered the fuse had gone out at the splice. They relit the fuse and skeedaddled. The explosives blew up at 4:44 a.m. Cannons and soldiers were scattered everywhere. The Union soldiers rushed into the gap, but they were without leadership. Their commanding officer was drunk behind the lines.

    While the Union soldiers milled around, the Confederates had time to regroup and drive the Union soldiers out with great loss. And the war dragged on till the following April. At the end of his presentation, we all gave Steve/Pleasants a rousing Huzzah!

   Col. Pleasants survived the war and returned to mining in Pennsylvania. Baldy Smith was relieved of his command and was sent to a backwater for the rest of the war. Grant eventually captured Lee's army and went on to a successful career in politics. And as for the general who was drunk in his bunker during the explosion? He too was an engineer and went out west to help build the transcontinental railroad.

Colonel Pleasants contemplates the entrance to his mine.