The Plan-Wilderness Battlefield Exhibit Shelter – Locust Grove VA - U.S. Civil War Sites on Waymarking.com

The Plan

With Grant in overall command, the war would be radically different in 1864. He pledged to “hammer continuously” at the South. The advance of the Army of the Potomac would be one of five major offensives along a 1,500-mile front. Grant halted the exchange of prisoners. Civilians would suffer at the hand of advancing armies—yielding crops, livestock, and in some cases homes to Union forces. The goal: to defeat Confederate armies and demolish the South’s capacity to wage war.

In Virginia, Grant set as his objective not the Confederate capital at Richmond, but Lee’s army. On May 4, 1864, the Army of the Potomac started across the Rapidan River below Lee’s right flank. Grant hoped to move quickly through the choked, tangled area known as the Wilderness and engage Lee in the open land to the south and west. But cumbersome wagon trains slowed him down. On May 5 the armies collided in the Wilderness.

“Lee’s army will be your objective point. Wherever Lee goes, there you will go also.” U.S. Grant to George Gordon Meade, April 9, 1964

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Date Logged Log User Rating   08/16/2023 Don.Morfe visited it