th of June--forty-eight hours after it commenced
--before parties were got out to collect the men left upon the field.
In the meantime all but two of the wounded had died. And I wrote to
Lee:

COLD HARBOR, VA., June 7, 1864. 10.30 A.M.

GEN. R. E. LEE, Commanding Army of N. Va.

I regret that your note of seven P.M. yesterday should have been
received at the nearest corps headquarters, to where it was delivered,
after the hour which had been given for the removal of the dead and
wounded had expired; 10.45 P.M. was the hour at which it was received at
corps headquarters, and between eleven and twelve it reached my
headquarters. As a consequence, it was not understood by the troops of
this army that there was a cessation of hostilities for the purpose of
collecting the dead and wounded, and none were collected. Two officers
and six men of the 8th and 25th North Carolina Regts., who were out in
search of the bodies of officers of their respective regiments, were
captured and brought into our lines, owing to this want of
understanding. I regret this, but will state that as soon as I learned
the fact, I directed that they should not be held as prisoners, but must
be returned to their commands. These officers and men having been
carelessly brought through our lines to the rear have not determined
whether they will be sent back the way they came, or whether they will
be sent by some other route.

Regretting that all my efforts for alleviating the sufferings of wounded
men left upon the battle-field have been rendered nugatory, I remain,
&c.,

U. S. GRANT, Lieutenant-General.

I have always regretted that the last assault at Cold Harbor was ever
made. I might say the same thing of the assault of the 22d of May,
1863, at Vicksburg. At Cold Harbor no advantage whatever was gained to
compensate for the heavy loss we sustained. Indeed, the advantages
other than those of relative losses, were on the Confederate side.
Before that, the Army of Northern Virginia seemed to have acquired a
wholesome regard for the courage, endurance, and soldierly qualities
generally of the Army of the Potomac. They no longer wanted to fight
them "one Confederate to five Yanks." Indeed, they seemed to have given
up any idea of gaining any advantage of their antagonist in the open
field. They had come to much prefer breastworks in their front to the
Army of the Potomac. This charge seemed to revive their hopes
temporarily; but it w