front-line fire of musketry, as well as by the staunch artillery,
which again gave its infantry the comfort of the guns. But that
was all.

Thus ended the battle of Cold Harbor, the last pitched battle on
Virginian soil. Grant reported it in three short sentences; and
afterwards referred to it in these other three. "I have always
regretted that the last assault [_i.e._, the whole battle of the
third of June] was ever made. No advantage whatever was gained
to compensate for the heavy loss. Indeed, the advantages, other
than those of relative losses, were on the Confederate side." Even
these, however, were also on the Confederate side, as Grant lost
nearly thirteen thousand, while Lee lost less than eighteen hundred.
Cold Harbor undoubtedly lowered Union morale, both at the front
and all through the loyal North. It encouraged the Peace Party,
revived Confederate hopes, and shook the army's faith in Grant's
commandership. Martin McMahon, a Union general, writing many years
after the event, of which he was a most competent witness, said:
"It was the dreary, dismal, bloody, ineffective close of the
lieutenant-general's first campaign with the Army of the Potomac."

Cold Harbor caused a change of plan. Reporting two days later Grant
said: "I now find, after thirty days of trial, the enemy deems it
of the first importance to run no risks with the armies they now
have. Without a greater sacrifice of human life than I am willing
to make all cannot be accomplished that I had designed outside of
the city [of Richmond]. I have therefore resolved upon the following
plan," which, in one word, involved a complete change from a series
of pitched battles to a long-drawn open siege.

The battles lasted thirty days, the siege three hundred. Therefore,
from this time on for the next ten months, Lee had to keep his living
shield between Grant's main body and the last great stronghold
of the fighting South, while the rising tide of Northern force,
commanding all the sea and an ever-increasing portion of the land,
beat ceaselessly against his front and flanks, threw out destroying
arms against his ever-diminishing sources of supply, and wore the
starving shield itself down to the very bone.

Grant's losses--forty thousand killed and wounded--were all made
good by immediate reinforcement; as was his other human wastage
from sickness, straggling, and desertion: made good, that is, in
the quantities required to wear out Lee, whose thinnin