TELEGRAPHIC REPORTS OF THE PRESS ASSOCIATION.
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THE NEWS FROM PETERSBURG. ONE OF THE ENEMY’S MINES SPRUNG—A PORTION OF OUR WORKS TEMPORARILY CARRIED BUT ARE SUBSEQUENTLY RECAPTURED AND THE ENEMY DRIVEN OUT WITH TERRIBLE SLAUGHTER.
PETERSBURG July 30—The enemy sprung a mine under our works on the Baxter road one and a half miles from the city, this morning about five o’clock blowing up a considerable portion of our works which were occupied by Pegram’s battery of this city, supported by Elliott’s South Carolina brigade [Elliott’s Brig., Johnson’s Div. Department of North Carolina and Southern Virginia].1
A number of lives were lost. The enemy at once bounded forward with a yell, driving in our forces and occupying a large portion of our lines. [Brigadier General William “Little Billy”] Mahone being notified of the condition of affairs, hurried his own [Virginia Brigade under Colonel David A. Weisiger] and Wright’s brigades [under Lt. Col. Matthew R. Hall] to the scene of action.
On their arrival he threw them forward to retake the works temporarily lost. They recaptured a large portion of the lines temporarily lost and took forty commissioned officers and four hundred privates, representing four divisions of Burnside’s corps.
Among the prisoners were some twenty negroes. The slaughter of the enemy during the engagement is represented by distinguished officers as the severest of the war for the numbers engaged.
The battlefield is literally strewn with dead negroes. The firing ceased at 9 o’clock [in the morning], but it is understood we will renew the attack at 2 o’clock [in the afternoon].
Among the casualties are General Elliott, of South Carolina, severely wounded; Colonel Weisiger, commanding Mahone’s brigade, slightly; Major Woodhouse, slightly; Captain Girardy, Mahone’s Assistant Adjutant General, slightly.
During the fight the enemy’s grape and shrapnel fell thick and fast in the outskirts of the city.
Our loss in prisoners is not believed to equal our captures.
The Yankee prisoners say Grant has been mining three weeks.
[SECOND DESPATCH.]
PETERSBURG July 30. About two o’clock today, everything being arranged, General Mahone threw forward Saunders’ [Colonel John C. C. Sanders’] Alabama brigade and which charged the enemy in gallant style, recapturing the rest of the breastworks temporarily lost, and taking about five hundred prisoners, including one hundred and fifty negroes, thirty-five officers, and Brigadier-General [Willliam F.] Bartlett, of the First division, Ninth corps [he commanded 1/1/IX/AotP], besides two stands of colours and four pieces of artillery lost by us this morning.
Over six hundred of the enemy’s dead are in our trenches.
Mahone’s and Wright’s brigades, besides prisoners captured this morning, took ten stands of colours.
Our lines are now identical as before the fight this morning, all the ground lost having been reclaimed.
Not over one hundred lives are believed to have been lost by the blowing up of the mine. The losses in Mahone’s division are not over two hundred killed and wounded.
Among the killed are Colonel [John W.] Evans, Sixty-fourth Georgia; Captain [George W.] Rush, commanding Twenty-second Georgia; Lieutenant Colonel [Henry W.] Williamson, [commanding] Sixth Virginia, slightly wounded.
The negroes charged, crying, “No quarter—remember Fort Pillow.”
All quiet to night.2
SOPO Editor’s Note: This article was transcribed by Jackie Martin.
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Source/Notes:
- SOPO Editor’s Note: This was of course the famous July 30, 1864 Battle of the Crater. ↩
- “Telegraphic Reports of the Press Association.” Richmond Examiner. August 1, 1864, p. 1 col. 4 ↩