Fort Stevens

“The operations near Washington, scene of the fight in front of Fort Stevens, July 12th-13th, 1864. When news of the Confederate invasion reached Grant he sent up to City Point the old Sixth Corps, that had so long battled under Sedgwick, whence they embarked for Washington. They went perhaps enjoying the scare of the Washington people, little suspecting that they were to have a brilliant little battle of their own under the eyes of the President. About six o’clock on the 12th the Confederates showed themselves coming down a declivity on both sides of Seventh Street road (Brookville Turnpike) into a little valley running across the road about a mile north of Fort Stevens. General Wright ordered a small brigade of infantry to clear out the enemy from his front. The dwelling on the hill opposite, shelter for sharpshooters, were preliminarily emptied by shells, which set them on fire- shells sent from Forts Massachusetts and Slocum. Then the Federal infantry rose, and, with a fanlike spreading to the right and left, dashed with hurrahs of delight at the two positions on each side of the Seventh Street road. The Confederates slid out of their rifle pits and leaped from behind their fences and trees, and raced. They did not stand a moment. A regiment of cavalry issued from a wood, seemingly Blair’s, to the succor of their flying infantry and sharpshooters. The Federals halted to receive the troopers’ charge, fired into them at close quarters, checked them, fired again, and kept firing. In three minutes neither Confederate cavalry nor infantry was in sight. The Federals double-quicked in line of battle over the crest of the heights, and disappeared in pursuit, with hurrahs and laughter, on the other wise, driving Rodes’s and Gordon’s divisions of Ewell’s corps in headlong flight before them."— Frank Leslie, 1896

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