victorious might. He knew, moreover, that the government and the people
trusted him and would sustain him, as they trusted and would sustain no
other, in a fresh and final attempt to destroy the Army of Northern
Virginia, upon which the hopes of the Confederacy were staked. Not so
much ambition as duty determined him to make his headquarters with the
Army of the Potomac.

CHAPTER XIII

THE WILDERNESS AND SPOTTSYLVANIA

Wherever Grant had control in the West, and in all his counsels, his
distinct purpose was to mass the Union forces and not scatter them, and
to get at the enemy. With what ideas and intention he began the new task
he set forth definitely in his report made in July, 1865.

"From an early period in the rebellion, I had been impressed with the
idea that the active and continuous operations of all the troops that
could be brought into the field, regardless of season and weather, were
necessary to a speedy termination of the war.... I therefore determined,
first, to use the greatest number of troops practicable against the
armed force of the enemy, preventing him from using the same force at
different seasons against first one and then another of our armies, and
the possibility of repose for refitting and producing necessary
supplies for carrying on resistance; second, to hammer continuously
against the armed force of the enemy and his resources, until by mere
attrition, if in no other way, there should be nothing left to him but
an equal submission with the loyal sections of our common country to the
Constitution and laws of the land."

Grant instructed General Butler, who had a large army at Fortress
Monroe, to make Richmond his objective point. He instructed General
Meade, commanding the Army of the Potomac, that Lee's army "would be his
objective point, and wherever Lee went he would go also." He hoped to
defeat and capture Lee, or to drive him back on Richmond, following
close and establishing a connection with Butler's army there, if Butler
had succeeded in advancing so far. Sherman was to move against
Johnston's army, and Sigel, with a strong force, was to protect West
Virginia and Pennsylvania from incursions. This, with plans for keeping
all the other armies of the Confederacy so occupied that Lee could not
draw from them, constituted the grand strategy of the campaign.

The theatre of operations of the Army of the Potomac was a region of
country lying west of a nearly north-and-south l