other and open a way for the infantry
columns. Wilson crossed Corbin's bridge, charged through the town
driving out some of Fitzhugh Lee's cavalrymen and pursuing them several
miles beyond. Merritt and Gregg made a good start and if they had been
allowed to proceed would have had no difficulty in accomplishing what
Sheridan desired to have them do. But without notice to Sheridan, Meade
countermanded the orders to those two officers directing them to halt
at the bridges and not cross. The result was that Wilson was isolated,
Merritt's cavalry became inextricably entangled with Warren's infantry,
so that neither one of them reached Spottsylvania, as they were both
expected to do, Gregg was neutralized, Wilson's safety jeoparded,
Sheridan's combinations broken up without his knowledge, and the way was
left open for Lee's infantry, so that Anderson with Longstreet's corps
took advantage of the situation and drove Wilson out and took
possession--thus paving the way for Lee to form a defensive line there
instead of farther south, probably inside the defenses of Richmond. Then
it befell that a series of bloody battles had to be fought to regain
what was thus foolishly surrendered; to regain what indeed might have
been held with slight loss, if Sheridan had been let alone, and
permitted to have his way. If he had been given a free hand, and
assuming that Warren, Burnside, Sedgwick and Hancock would have carried
out their part of the program with the same zeal and skill displayed by
Sheridan, it is certain that the battle of Spottsylvania with its
"bloody angle" would never have taken place.

The affair was a fiasco, but for that no blame can be attached to either
Sheridan or Grant, unless the latter be considered blameworthy for not
directing the movements in person instead of leaving the tactics of the
battle to be worked out by Meade.

Once more, as in the Wilderness, the cavalry was drawn in. The entire
corps was massed in rear of the infantry and rendered inert. Sheridan
with his ten thousand troopers was held idle and inactive while Warren,
Sedgwick and Burnside were given the task of defeating Lee's veteran
army without Sheridan's help. All his plans were rendered nugatory. He
became satisfied that his efforts were useless. About noon he went to
Meade's headquarters and they had an interview which is one of the
famous historical episodes of the civil war. He told Meade that,
inasmuch as his plans were to be interfered wi