{ "slug": "gaines-mill", "title": "Battle of Gaines's Mill", "status": "draft", "era": "1850–1900", "date_text": "27 June 1862", "start": "1862-06-27", "end": "1862-06-27", "war": "American Civil War", "cdb90_war": "AMERICAN CIVIL WAR", "place": { "name": "Gaines's Mill, Hanover County, Virginia, United States", "lat": 37.579, "lon": -77.2872, "wikidata": "Q1809351" }, "lede": "On 27 June 1862 Robert E. Lee threw most of his army at Fitz John Porter's isolated Union corps north of the Chickahominy. A dusk breakthrough won Lee his first clear victory and drove McClellan to abandon the advance on Richmond.", "result": "Confederate victory; Porter's corps retreated across the Chickahominy and McClellan retreated to the James", "result_cdb90": "attacker loss", "belligerents": [ { "role": "attacker", "name": "Confederate Army of Northern Virginia", "commanders": [ "Gen. Robert E. Lee", "Maj. Gen. Thomas J. 'Stonewall' Jackson", "Maj. Gen. James Longstreet", "Maj. Gen. A. P. Hill", "Maj. Gen. D. H. Hill" ], "strength": { "value": 57018, "low": 57000, "high": 60000, "source": "s3" }, "casualties": { "value": 8700, "low": 7993, "high": 8700, "source": "s2" } }, { "role": "defender", "name": "Union V Corps, Army of the Potomac", "commanders": [ "Brig. Gen. Fitz John Porter", "Brig. Gen. George W. Morell", "Brig. Gen. George Sykes", "Brig. Gen. Henry W. Slocum" ], "strength": { "value": 34214, "low": 34000, "high": 40000, "source": "s3" }, "casualties": { "value": 6837, "low": 6800, "high": 7337, "source": "s1" } } ], "sections": { "background": "By late May 1862 McClellan's Army of the Potomac had stalled in front of Richmond after Seven Pines. Lee, newly in command, chose to attack. He planned to shift about 90,000 men north of the city and strike McClellan's exposed right flank, and Stuart's cavalry ride confirmed that the flank was open. Jackson's command was to come by rail from the Shenandoah Valley.\n\nThe Seven Days began with Oak Grove on 25 June. The next day Lee's attack at Beaver Dam Creek (Mechanicsville) failed, and it was a Union tactical success, but it left Porter's V Corps alone north of the Chickahominy. McClellan ordered Porter to withdraw and decided to move his supply base from the Pamunkey River to the James River at Harrison's Landing. Wikipedia calls that decision fatal to the campaign, because it cut off the railroad needed to supply the heavy siege artillery.\n\nLee's plan for 27 June repeated the previous day's pattern. A. P. Hill and Longstreet would press Porter's front while Jackson, with D. H. Hill, struck his flank and rear. Lee wrongly assumed Porter was holding the line of Powhite Creek, west of where he actually stood. Porter had fallen back about four miles before dawn, crossed Boatswain's Creek and taken up a strong position with the Chickahominy behind him.", "forces": "Porter's V Corps held a semicircular plateau behind Boatswain's Swamp, near Dr William Gaines's mill. Morell's division was on the left and Sykes's regulars on the right, with McCall's division in reserve. Slocum's division, from Franklin's VI Corps, was across the river and arrived during the afternoon. McClellan worried about an attack on Franklin's front elsewhere and hesitated to send more. About 34,000 Union troops were available; historians differ, with Burton counting 36,000 effectives of whom about 31,000 were actually engaged, and Salmon about 40,000.\n\nLee's attacking force was about 57,000 in six divisions, the largest Confederate attack of the war. The attackers had to cross swamps, creeks and woods that favoured the defenders.\n\nIn the evening Lee committed 16 brigades of about 32,100 men against the roughly 34,000 Union defenders on a front of about 2.25 miles. Berdan's sharpshooters and the 5th New York Zouaves were among the Union units that checked the first Confederate attacks. Lee's army included Jackson's wing, which had come from the Shenandoah Valley, and the divisions of Longstreet and the two Hills; the Union side was a single corps whose commander, Porter, was acting on McClellan's orders to cover the army's withdrawal to the James.", "course": "**Cold Harbor (noon to 1 p.m.)** D. H. Hill's division reached Old Cold Harbor and met unexpected fire. Union regulars under Sykes outgunned Hill's battery, and Hill chose to wait for Jackson. Lee's headquarters did not hear the fighting.\n\n**A. P. Hill's attack (early afternoon)** Hill's brigades, under Gregg, Branch, Anderson and Field, attacked Porter's line along Boatswain's Creek. The swamp, Berdan's sharpshooters and the 5th New York Zouaves stopped them. The 1st South Carolina lost 57% of its men, and Hill lost about 2,000 of 13,200. Lee was near the front and rallied troops.\n\n**Jackson's delay (afternoon)** A guide, Private John Henry Timberlake, led Jackson down the wrong road. Felled trees and sharpshooters added to the delay, and garbled orders left troops waiting for over an hour. Lee greeted him with 'General, I am glad to see you and I only wish I could have been with you sooner.' Stephen Sears argues that if Jackson had arrived on time, the attack could have come three or four hours earlier.\n\n**Ewell and Longstreet (about 3:30 p.m.)** Ewell attacked with Louisiana troops under Seymour, who was killed, and then Wheat, who was also killed. The brigade withdrew. Trimble's regiments stalled at the swamp. Porter fed in reinforcements from Slocum. Pickett's frontal assault on Longstreet's front failed and Pickett was wounded, as Jefferson Davis watched. Meanwhile McClellan, encouraged by Porter's telegrams, told Porter to 'pitch in' if the enemy was retiring.\n\n**The general assault (7 p.m.)** Lee's main assault used 16 brigades, about 32,100 men, against about 34,000 Union defenders on a 2.25-mile front. The attacks were uncoordinated and were repulsed in places. D. H. Hill's division, Lawton's Georgians and the Stonewall Brigade pushed forward. Elzey was wounded and Fulkerson mortally wounded, and the 5th Alabama lost its colonel and colours to the 5th Maine.\n\n**Breakthrough (dusk)** Whiting's division broke through on Longstreet's front. Hood's Texas Brigade drove into the line, and Pickett succeeded on his second assault. The Union line collapsed, and nine Union regimental commanders were killed or wounded. Sykes's regulars withdrew in order to Grapevine Bridge. Meagher's and French's brigades arrived too late to do more than cover the retreat. A battalion of the 5th U.S. Cavalry under Captain Charles J. Whiting charged the Texas Brigade and surrendered. By about 4 a.m. on 28 June Porter had crossed the Chickahominy and burned the bridges.\n\nThis is the single CDB90 engagement 'GAINES'S MILL' (12:30 to 21:00).", "aftermath": "Union losses were about 6,800 and Confederate about 8,000 to 8,700, the exact numbers disputed. More than two dozen Union guns were captured, and nine regimental commanders were killed or wounded. Only about one third of McClellan's army was engaged, so it came out of the fight in relatively good shape.\n\nThe battle was the largest of the Seven Days and Lee's first clear victory as commander of the Army of Northern Virginia. It unnerved McClellan, who abandoned his advance on Richmond and began moving the army to the James River, which showed the Confederacy that the capital was out of danger. It changed McClellan's strategy more than it changed the ground.\n\nHistorians stress that Lee's attack cost more than it needed to. Jackson's late arrival and the uncoordinated Confederate assaults are the usual criticisms; Edward Porter Alexander agreed that an earlier attack would have given an easy victory. Until 2011 only about 60 acres around the Watt House were preserved by the National Park Service; the American Battlefield Trust and its partners have since preserved 932 acres.", "wargaming": "Gaines's Mill is a frontal assault on a strong position, played as a single day. The Union player has a compact semicircle on a plateau behind a swamp, and a river at their back with bridges that matter at the end. At regimental scale with brigades as units the table is manageable, and at brigade scale the whole battle fits a single evening.\n\nThe design question is timing. A. P. Hill and D. H. Hill go in early and in pieces, Jackson arrives late, and Lee's general assault only comes at 7 p.m. A game can give the Confederate player the choice of waiting for Jackson, which costs daylight, or attacking piecemeal, which costs men. Swamp and creek terrain should slow and disorder attackers heavily, and the Union reserves, Slocum's division and the II Corps brigades, should arrive in a trickle that the Union player must commit well. Porter's telegrams to McClellan make a good reinforcement mechanism.\n\nThe interesting 'what ifs' are Jackson on time, with the assault three or four hours earlier and the Union reserves not yet across; and McClellan sending more troops. Victory conditions could weigh Union holding the bridges until dark against Confederate casualties, since Lee's tactical win was costly." }, "images": [ { "file": "File:Seven Days June 26-27.png", "kind": "map", "caption": "The Seven Days Battles, 26–27 June 1862: Beaver Dam Creek and Gaines's Mill.", "url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/f9/Seven_Days_June_26-27.png?utm_source=commons.wikimedia.org&utm_campaign=imageinfo&utm_content=original", "thumb": "https://thumb.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/f/f9/Seven_Days_June_26-27.png/960px-Seven_Days_June_26-27.png?utm_source=commons.wikimedia.org&utm_campaign=imageinfo&utm_content=thumbnail", "page": "https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Seven_Days_June_26-27.png", "licence": "CC BY 3.0", "licence_url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0", "artist": "Hal Jespersen", "credit": "Own work", "width": 1656 }, { "file": "File:Gaines's Mill 1430.png", "kind": "map", "caption": "The Battle of Gaines's Mill at 2:30 p.m.", "url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/e6/Gaines%27s_Mill_1430.png?utm_source=commons.wikimedia.org&utm_campaign=imageinfo&utm_content=original", "thumb": "https://thumb.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/e/e6/Gaines%27s_Mill_1430.png/960px-Gaines%27s_Mill_1430.png?utm_source=commons.wikimedia.org&utm_campaign=imageinfo&utm_content=thumbnail", "page": "https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Gaines%27s_Mill_1430.png", "licence": "CC BY 3.0", "licence_url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0", "artist": "Hal Jespersen", "credit": "Own work", "width": 2437 }, { "file": "File:Gaines's Mill 1900.png", "kind": "map", "caption": "The Battle of Gaines's Mill at 7 p.m., as the general assault began.", "url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/3a/Gaines%27s_Mill_1900.png?utm_source=commons.wikimedia.org&utm_campaign=imageinfo&utm_content=original", "thumb": "https://thumb.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/3/3a/Gaines%27s_Mill_1900.png/960px-Gaines%27s_Mill_1900.png?utm_source=commons.wikimedia.org&utm_campaign=imageinfo&utm_content=thumbnail", "page": "https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Gaines%27s_Mill_1900.png", "licence": "CC BY 3.0", "licence_url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0", "artist": "Hal Jespersen", "credit": "Own work", "width": 2437 }, { "file": "File:Battle of Gaines Mill.jpg", "kind": "illustration", "caption": "Alfred R. Waud's sketch of the Battle of Gaines's Mill, published in Harper's Weekly, 1862.", "url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/d2/Battle_of_Gaines_Mill.jpg?utm_source=commons.wikimedia.org&utm_campaign=imageinfo&utm_content=original", "thumb": "https://thumb.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/d/d2/Battle_of_Gaines_Mill.jpg/960px-Battle_of_Gaines_Mill.jpg?utm_source=commons.wikimedia.org&utm_campaign=imageinfo&utm_content=thumbnail", "page": "https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Battle_of_Gaines_Mill.jpg", "licence": "Public domain", "licence_url": "", "artist": "original sketch by Alfred R. Waud", "credit": "Son of the South (Civil War history)", "width": 1350 }, { "file": "File:Confederates advancing to the capture of disabled guns. Gaines Mills LCCN2004660787.jpg", "kind": "illustration", "caption": "Confederates advancing to capture disabled guns at Gaines's Mill, drawn by Alfred R. Waud.", "url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/78/Confederates_advancing_to_the_capture_of_disabled_guns._Gaines_Mills_LCCN2004660787.jpg?utm_source=commons.wikimedia.org&utm_campaign=imageinfo&utm_content=original", "thumb": "https://thumb.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/7/78/Confederates_advancing_to_the_capture_of_disabled_guns._Gaines_Mills_LCCN2004660787.jpg/960px-Confederates_advancing_to_the_capture_of_disabled_guns._Gaines_Mills_LCCN2004660787.jpg?utm_source=commons.wikimedia.org&utm_campaign=imageinfo&utm_content=thumbnail", "page": "https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Confederates_advancing_to_the_capture_of_disabled_guns._Gaines_Mills_LCCN2004660787.jpg", "licence": "Public domain", "licence_url": "", "artist": "Waud, Alfred R. (Alfred Rudolph), 1828-1891, artist", "credit": "Library of Congress Catalog: https://lccn.loc.gov/2004660787 Image download: https://cdn.loc.gov/service/pnp/ppmsca/21100/21140v.jpg Original url: https://www.loc.gov/pictures/item/2004660787/", "width": 1024 }, { "file": "File:Fitz John Porter - Brady-Handy.jpg", "kind": "portrait", "caption": "Brigadier General Fitz John Porter, commander of the Union V Corps.", "url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/91/Fitz_John_Porter_-_Brady-Handy.jpg?utm_source=commons.wikimedia.org&utm_campaign=imageinfo&utm_content=original", "thumb": "https://thumb.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/9/91/Fitz_John_Porter_-_Brady-Handy.jpg/960px-Fitz_John_Porter_-_Brady-Handy.jpg?utm_source=commons.wikimedia.org&utm_campaign=imageinfo&utm_content=thumbnail", "page": "https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Fitz_John_Porter_-_Brady-Handy.jpg", "licence": "Public domain", "licence_url": "", "artist": "Mathew Benjamin Brady", "credit": "Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division. Brady-Handy Photograph Collection. https://hdl.loc.gov/loc.pnp/cwpbh.00943 . CALL NUMBER: LC-BH82- 3817 [P&P]", "width": 2440 }, { "file": "File:Stonewall Jackson.jpg", "kind": "portrait", "caption": "Stonewall Jackson, in the portrait taken in April 1863.", "url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/82/Stonewall_Jackson.jpg?utm_source=commons.wikimedia.org&utm_campaign=imageinfo&utm_content=original", "thumb": "https://thumb.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/8/82/Stonewall_Jackson.jpg/960px-Stonewall_Jackson.jpg?utm_source=commons.wikimedia.org&utm_campaign=imageinfo&utm_content=thumbnail", "page": "https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Stonewall_Jackson.jpg", "licence": "Public domain", "licence_url": "", "artist": "Unknown author Unknown author", "credit": "Derivative (crop) of: File:Photograph of General Thomas J. \"Stonewall\" Jackson - NARA - 526067.tif", "width": 1207 } ], "sources": [ { "id": "s1", "title": "Battle of Gaines' Mill (Wikipedia)", "url": "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Gaines%27_Mill", "kind": "web" }, { "id": "s2", "title": "Gaines' Mill (American Battlefield Trust)", "url": "https://www.battlefields.org/learn/civil-war/battles/gaines-mill", "kind": "web" }, { "id": "s3", "title": "David J. Eicher, The Longest Night: A Military History of the Civil War (Simon & Schuster, 2001)", "url": null, "kind": "book" }, { "id": "s4", "title": "Stephen W. Sears, To the Gates of Richmond: The Peninsula Campaign (Ticknor & Fields, 1992)", "url": null, "kind": "book" }, { "id": "s5", "title": "Brian K. Burton, Extraordinary Circumstances: The Seven Days Battles (Indiana University Press, 2001)", "url": null, "kind": "book" } ], "cdb90": [ 185 ], "order": 113, "url": "https://battles.georgewyrd.com/gaines-mill/", "oob": [], "oob_lwtv": [], "scenarios": [], "orbat": null, "orbat_lwtv": null, "reading": { "prose": [], "history": [], "fiction": [], "poetry": [] }, "reading_lwtv": { "prose": [], "poetry": [] }, "photos": [], "photos_kind": "photographs", "newspapers": null }