and
thence by way of New Kent Courthouse and Williamsburg to Yorktown. At
Yorktown the various regiments took transports to Washington and from
Washington marched back to their old camps around Stevensburg, no event
of importance marking the journey. They arrived on the Rapidan about the
middle of the month, having been absent two weeks. The men stood the
experience better than the horses. The animals were weakened and worn
out and the time remaining before the opening of active operations was
hardly sufficient for their recuperation.

CHAPTER XVI

THE WILDERNESS CAMPAIGN

In the spring of 1864, the cavalry of the army of the Potomac was
thoroughly reorganized. Pleasonton, who had been rather a staff officer
of the general commanding the army than a real chief of cavalry, was
retired and Sheridan took his place. Kilpatrick was sent to the west and
James H. Wilson, an engineer officer, succeeded him in command of the
Third division. Buford's old division, the First, was placed under
Torbert, an infantry officer whose qualifications as a commander of
cavalry were not remarkable. There were several of his subordinates who
were both more capable and more deserving, notably Custer, Merritt and
Thomas C. Devin. John Buford, the heroic, one of the ablest of all the
generals of division, had succumbed to the exposures of the previous
campaign. His death befell in December, 1863, on the very day when he
received his commission as major-general, a richly deserved reward for
his splendid and patriotic services in the Gettysburg and other
campaigns. His death created a void which it was hard to fill. Gregg was
the only one of the three old and tried division commanders who remained
with the corps.

Of the generals of brigade, Merritt and Devin remained with their old
division. Davies was transferred from the Third to the Second, and
Custer's Michigan brigade became the First brigade of the First
division, the general going with it.

Pleasonton who was sent to Rosecrans, in Missouri, although perhaps not,
like his illustrious successor, a cavalry chief of the first rank, had a
brilliant record, and in the campaign of 1863 had performed most
meritorious and effective service and certainly deserves a high place in
the list of union leaders of that period. In all the campaigns of the
year 1863, he acquitted himself with the highest credit and in many of
the battles, notably at Chancellorsville, Middleburg and Brandy Stat