Fort Wadsworth at Petersburg National Battlefield

WESTERN FRONT DRIVING TOUR

STOP 1:  Fort Wadsworth

Allow 10 minutes for a visit

The first stop on the Western Front Driving Tour at Petersburg National Battlefield is at Fort Wadsworth. After successfully capturing a section of the Petersburg Railroad, commonly known as the Weldon Railroad, in a four-day battle on August 18-21, 1864, the Union Army built Fort Wadsworth right next to the tracks to protect its position (the tracks still exist today). The Weldon Railroad connected Richmond with Wilmington, North Carolina, and with the tracks now blocked, Confederate supplies had to be off-loaded south of the blockage into wagons and transported to Petersburg via the Boydton Plank Road, which the Confederates still controlled. At the time, Fort Wadsworth was as far west as the Union line extended.

Remnants of the Fort Wadsworth earthworks at Petersburg National Battlefield

Located at the Fort Wadsworth stop on the tour are the remnants of the fort’s earthworks, two wayside exhibits (one in such poor condition that it is illegible), and two monuments, one honoring the South Carolina troops who fought at the Battle of the Weldon Railroad and one honoring the South Carolina regiments under the command of General Johnson Hagood. Of the 740 men of Hagood’s Brigade who charged the Union line on August 21, 1864, only 273 made it back to fight another day. The rest were killed, wounded, or captured.

South Carolina Troop monument at Fort Wadsworth, Petersburg National Battlefield

Hagood Brigade Monument at Fort Wadsworth, Petersburg National Battlefield

BATTLE OF THE WELDON RAILROAD

After the first unsuccessful attack on Petersburg in mid-June 1864, Union general Ulysses S. Grant realized that taking the city by direct assault was not going to work, so he instead decided to cut off Petersburg’s supply lines from the south. To do so, the Union army gradually worked its way west, south of the city, capturing major roads and railroads along the way.

While called the Siege of Petersburg, the situation was never a traditional siege where an aggressor surrounds a city and waits for the defenders to run out of food and other supplies. First off, Petersburg was never surrounded, and Grant had no intentions of doing so. Confederate soldiers and civilians were always free to head north across the Appomattox River, which ran east to west just north of the city. There were no substantial supply lines to the north or east, for Virginia was bordered by Union states in those directions, and the farms and factories that were in northern Virginia were largely depleted and destroyed by 1865. The supplies came from the deep south and west, so all Grant had to do was create a semicircular blockade south of Petersburg from the Appomattox River on the east side to the farthest western supply line into the city, the South Side Railroad. By the time the siege ended on April 2, 1865, the Union line was over 30 miles long.

Second, Grant never sat back and waited. A month after the first attack on Petersburg, rail lines and roads both to the south and north of Petersburg were still under Confederate control, and supplies were getting into the city (and into Richmond as well). For the Union to seize control of these supply lines, it would take an awful lot of fighting, often times full-fledged battles.

A major western target for the Union was the Petersburg Railroad, commonly known as the Weldon Railroad. On the morning of August 18, 1864, Union soldiers of the Fifth Corps under the command of General Gouverneur K. Warren, along with supporting troops of the Second and Ninth Corps, where ordered west to the railroad tracks to destroy them. As they proceeded up the tracks towards the intersection of Halifax and Vaugh roads, which is north of Fort Wadsworth, they started taking fire from a small group of Confederates, whom they easily ran off with return fire. The Union soldiers then took up a position along the railroad to prepare for a possible larger assault. This fighting was the opening of what would become known as The Battle of the Weldon Railroad. A common landmark in the area was the Globe Tavern, so the fighting is also known as The Battle of the Globe Tavern.

Upon being notified as to what was going on, Confederate general Pierre G. T. Beauregard sent General Henry Heth and three brigades of men south along Halifax Road. Around 3 PM the two sides met in combat. The Confederates drove the Union soldiers back three quarters of a mile before Warren could bring reinforcements onto the field. When night came, Warren’s men dug in, effectively extending the Union line of fortifications to the Weldon Railroad tracks. Now the Confederates would have to attack fortified Union positions to push them off the tracks.

Fighting continued until the 21st (heavy rain on the 20th made that a day of rest). In the end, the Union was able to keep control of the tracks. Lee would now have to unload supplies farther south and transport them 30 miles by wagon along the Boydton Plank Road, which for a time, the Confederates still controlled.

Petersburg Battle Map August 18-19, 1864 (provided by CWMaps.com)

Stop 2: Polar Grove National Cemetery | Western Front Tour Home Page

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