either. It
was at this time that Grant sent his celebrated despatch stating that
he "proposed to fight it out on this line if it took all summer."

Finally he sought to turn Lee's right flank. June 8, the battle of Cold
Harbor followed this movement. The Union forces were shot down in the
mire and brush by Lee's troops, now snugly in out of the wet, behind the
Cold Harbor defences. One historian says that in twenty minutes ten
thousand Yankee troops were killed; though Badeau, whose accuracy in
counting dead has always been perfectly marvellous, admits only seven
thousand in all.

Grant now turned his attention towards Petersburg, but Lee was there
before him and intrenched, so the Union army had to intrench. This only
postponed the evil day, however.

Things now shaped themselves into a siege of Richmond, with Petersburg
as the first outpost of the besieged capital.

On the 30th of July, eight thousand pounds of powder were carefully
inserted under a Confederate fort and the entire thing hoisted in the
air, leaving a huge hole, in which, a few hours afterwards, many a boy
in blue met his death, for in the assault which followed the explosion
the Union soldiers were mowed down by the concentrated fire of the
Confederates. The Federals threw away four thousand lives here.

On the 18th of August the Weldon Railroad was captured, which was a
great advantage to Grant, and, though several efforts were made to
recapture it, they were unsuccessful.

[Illustration: PAUSING TO GET LAUNDRY-WORK DONE.]

General Early was delegated to threaten Washington and scare the able
officers of the army who were stopping there at that time talking
politics and abusing Grant. He defeated General Wallace at Monocacy
River, and appeared before Fort Stevens, one of the defences of
Washington, July 11. Had he whooped right along instead of pausing a day
somewhere to get laundry-work done before entering Washington, he would
easily have captured the city.

Reinforcements, however, got there ahead of him, and he had to go back.
He sent a force of cavalry into Pennsylvania, where they captured
Chambersburg and burned it on failure of the town trustees to pay five
hundred thousand dollars ransom.

General Sheridan was placed in charge of the troops here, and defeated
Early at Winchester, riding twenty miles in twenty minutes, as per poem.
At Fisher's Hill he was also victorious. He devastated the Valley of the
Shenandoah to such a degree