page_title: Battle of Wilson's Wharf
section_title: Battle
hierarchical_section_title: Battle of Wilson's Wharf / Battle
caption_attribution_description: English: Map of battlefield core and study areas. The revised Study Area includes the approach route of the USS Dawn.
context_page_description: The Battle of Wilson's Wharf was a battle in Union Lt. Gen. Ulysses S. Grant's Overland Campaign against Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee's Army of Northern Virginia.
  On May 24, Confederate Maj. Gen. Fitzhugh Lee's cavalry division attacked the Union supply depot at Wilson's Wharf, on the James River in eastern Charles City, Virginia. They were repulsed by two African American regiments of the United States Colored Troops under the command of Brig. Gen. Edward A. Wild, who were in the process of constructing a fortification there, which was subsequently named Fort Pocahontas. The battle was the first combat encounter of Robert E. Lee's Army of Northern Virginia with African-American troops.
context_section_description: Around noon on May 24, Lee's men charged and drove in the Union pickets who were posted near the Charles City Road, about a 1 mile (1.6 km) north of the fort. By 1:30 p.m. the fort was invested and Lee sent two officers under a flag of truce with a message demanding the surrender of the garrison. He promised that the black soldiers would be taken to Richmond and treated as prisoners of war, but if they did not surrender, he would not be "answerable for the consequences." Wild and his men interpreted this to mean that some of the men would be returned to their former masters and others would be tried by state authorities for inciting insurrection. Wild sent back a written reply that said "We will try it" and verbally told the two officers "Take the fort if you can."
  Lee planned a two-pronged attack. Brig. Gen. Williams C. Wickham's brigade moved east of the fort, concealed in ravines of Kennon Creek. To distract the Federals from Wickham's attack, Col. John Dunovant of the 5th South Carolina demonstrated on the western end of the fort. Dunovant's men advanced as far as the ditch and abatis, but were driven back by heavy fire. Wickham's men rushed forward across an open field and were met by interlocking fields of musket fire, canister rounds from two 10-pounder Parrott rifles, and naval gunfire from the Dawn.
  As Lee looked for a weak point in the fort's defenses, Union reinforcements arrived at about 4 p.m. on the steamer George Washington, carrying four companies of the 10th USCT. Lee ordered his men to withdraw to Charles City Court House and the next morning they rode back to Atlee's Station.
caption: Map of Wilson's Wharf Battlefield core and study areas by the American Battlefield Protection Program.
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