Delaware gazette. [volume] (Delaware, Ohio) 1855-1886, 1865-11-10

widely remote Heids, naQ long been
struggling for the same great end, and
which had now. through the strange ap-
Dointments of Providence, been brought
to rejoice together on conquered soil over
their common victory.
The Corps encamped that night at
Wellville Station, 30 miles from Peters
burg It was ordered to move on the
morrow toward Richmond via Chester
field Court House. Thus its line of
march diverged to the left of the re-
nowned city of the AppOmattox. The
temptation to visit place of such world
wide interest when so near was too strong
even for military restraint or the most
Spartan self -deniaf9t accordingly the
writer reseiV Enthusiasm propo-
sition from joviai 6si iv friend to make
an exeuHsionriFa-s shat I'm on the fal-
lowing day. Our pTsgf.SI'.55, sITtc1f 70.
our great JOY was cchcnrredaiD by cur
ever generous-hearted General, was soon
arranged and partly embodied In our pass
which ran as follows. The bearers and
an orderly have permission to visit Pc
tersburg and rejoin this command at
Richmond by the 9th inst.
Before aurora has yet Unbolted morn
in.g's golden gates we had mounted our
rowed and beaten track which marked
the course of the army when in pursuit
of Lees fugitive legions. The old wagon
road leading in substantially the same
direction had become obsolete beside
this broad highway improvised at a time
when the April rains made it necessary
to choose the most solid and easy
track for the trains and artillery. In
many places there stillremained great seas
of mud through which the struggling
teams had fioundered, and in which all
Al -adi pf fo0oao ha6 hoaD a0o11lDbod
in the vain effort to construct solid
passage Many poor hybrid had here
been hopelessly swamped, and their
swelled bodies heaving up from the
slough were painfully suggestive of the
cruelty to beasts as well as men of the
demon War.
The rail and wagon roads followed the
line of a low plateau constituting the
watershed between the tributaries of the
Nottoway and those of the Appomattox
1t is a low, sWampy country, not only
destitute of beauty, but offensive with
treacherous bog, dank morass and gloomy
fen of tangled underground and funereal,
over-shadoWing evergreens. Here and
there the deserted remnants of demollsh-
ed buildings told with mute but sad elo-
quenee how the xeugh hand of war had
violated the home of some solitary set
tier, and in one rude hour had laid waste
the patient accumulations of many toll
some years. The vacant stables, rum
mayed outhouses, ruined fences, broken
gateways, pillaged and litter-strewn, and
Sometimes burned dwellings, bore witness
to the fact that foraglng "bummers be-
| longed not exclusively to the migratory
and self-dependent army of sherman
| do you think any soldiers will pass here
| to-day?" nervously inquired the owner of
one of these pilaged establishments
He spoke Ia sUBdpe9 and spirit-broken
accents, and his shabby suit of gray and
butternut was we'll in keeping with the
scene of ruin and devastation around
him. When told that the armies of
Georgia and Tennessee were even now
passing through the country on either
side of him, his eyes dilated with min
gled terror and surprise.
We were now on historic ground. To
the left was NamOzine Greek, along whose
quaggy banks occurred one of the series
of great final struggles for Richmond
To the left was Hatcher's Run and Ro-
wanty Greek, streams famous In the re-
ports of many bloody and unsuccessful
efforts to turn or break through the enc
my's rigEt It is painful to remember
/ how often, even after the sanguinary bat
tie for the Weldon Railroad, the story
twas repeated of advances down the
| iBoydton Plank Road and up to the enc
my's lines on Hatcher's Run, together
with cooperative movements down the
] erusalcm Plank Road to Ream's Station
and aroun1 to Dinwiddie Court House
/ Again and again was the same programme
rehearsed in the newspapers, and as often
! followed by sickening details of fearful
lrepulse and slaughter of our forces
i Verify the names of Hatcher's Run ano
its little tributaries will be drawn in his.
) I / Al Jvr 1ho IG
Bull Run of Southern Virginia. Yet i
is consoling to know that the glorious
victories which finally gave us Peters
burg and Richmond were nothing more
than the eonsummation on a larger scale
of these so often thwarted efforts tt
overwhelm Lees right and get possession
of his communications Such was th'
remarkable success of the plans of tn
? commander-in-c chief and the indomaItbl
perseverance with which they were execu
: ted
A few miles east of Sutherlands is tn
7 lpeint where the Sixth Corps, after it
magnificent dash over Forts Welch an,
Fisher, broke through the rebel line ant
? seized the Southside Railway. A shor
: distance to the left, but concealed by th
! thick timber, is the AppomattOx, and on
> mile to the right are the two great lines o
f forts and fieldworke over which the tw
armies so long WreSIl6O. n lew mOH6At
( ride brought us to the rebel line in from
! of what had been the right of the Sixt
: Corps. 1t consisted in the main of
e heavy breastwork pursuing its zig-za
n course over the highest ground, with her
t and there a salient angle or a bastio
t adapted for artillery. Its simplicity {
S construction was remarkable considerin
8 that it covered the enemy's great arter
y of communication Fieldworks built b
S johnson in Georgia and not held by hil
e over fortnight were vastly more formiC
: able and complex. just behind th
y breastworks were the villages of cabir
It which had been occupied by the rebel so
d diers but were now all silent and deserte,
e The timber adjacent to the lines had bee
d cut away, and the neighboring fields wei
|, road-beaten and dusty with the tramp
a myriads of men and the endless roll
It heavy carriages The space interveniI
le between the lines of main werks WI
3 thickly indented and furrowed with Il
1t. bits, mounds, and trenches, which ha
d been used by the hostile pickets al
ID skirmishers Fl ere for months no OF
ID had dared to show himself outside
cover except at the risk of life. III
ground had been fought over again al
again, the little breastworks being oft
ID reversed and having faces looking in tv
ne or three different directions What da
st and nights of patient Watching, iudustl
Is Gus digging, and bloody fighting were he
o. expended
e. The line of Union works bore witne
as of immense labor. 1t was one mingl