Civil War – Battle of Spotsylvania Courthouse.

In May 1864, Union Commander, Ulysses S. Grant, launched his Overland Campaign, a relentless war of attrition aimed at forcing Lee’s Army of Northern Virginia into submission.  Opposing armies first clashed at the Battle of the Wilderness, then met outside Spotsylvania Courthouse.

Sgt. Charles Fall - 26th Michigan Infantry

Sergeant Charles Fall served with the 26th Michigan Infantry.  On May 12, 1864, 147 years ago today, he and his unit would find themselves at the center of it all.

At dawn, Hancock’s II Corps cut through the fleeting darkness, morning drizzle and rolling fog to attack the Confederate defenses at an exposed salient called the Mule Shoe.  Fall led the way as the 26th Michigan broke through the enemy lines.  He would be awarded the Medal of Honor for his heroics.  According to the citation, Sergeant Fall “was one of the first to mount the Confederate works, where he bayoneted two of the enemy and captured a Confederate flag, but threw it away to continue the pursuit of the enemy.”

Unsupported, the federal push ground to a halt.  Confederates soon counterattacked.  The ensuing hand-to-hand brawl would ebb and flow across the same small area for the next 20 hours.  The death trap would come to be known as “Bloody Angle.”

The carnage was on a scale never witnessed before, even in this, the bloodiest of all wars.  “Slaughter became an end in itself, unrelated to issues or objectives, as if it had nothing whatever to do with the war,” author Shelby Foote noted.  “Troops were killed by thrusts and stabs through chinks in the log barricade, while others were harpooned by bayoneted rifles flung javelin-style across it.”

Only days later, Fall attempted to explain the events, but fell admittedly short.  “That was a hard day’s fight, and I do not care to see another such,” he wrote to his family. “…We just more than butchered them. I saw them piled up some places five deep.  …We lost 186 in killed, wounded and missing in our Regt. Out of the number was but 25 killed, the others wounded and missing. …

“It was terrible, but had to be done, & your humble servant must have been crazy as he run his bayonet through some three of them, and with one of them had to put his foot on him to draw it out, besides shooting two or three that he knows of and using up 123 rounds of cartridges firing at them.

“Just imagine, a solid white oak tree, 20 inches through, standing between the two lines being cut down so that it fell among the rebs, with musket balls alone, and you may form some opinion of what the battle was. I cannot, neither can the pen describe the terrific struggle.”

The battle would rage on for another full week, ending in stalemate.  General Grant would reroute his troops to the southeast, where the two sides would resume hostilities near the North Anna River.

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