North Anna

Following the stalemate at Spotsylvania Court House the first week of May, 1864, Lieut. Gen. Ulysses S. Grant was determined to continue his Overland Campaign against Gen. Robert E. Lee's Army of Northern Virginia. Grant found the Confederates entrenched on the south side of the North Anna River, where Lee's "inverted V" defenses forced Grant to divide his forces into three parts to attack. On May 23, one of Maj. Gen. A.P. Hill’s divisions assaulted the isolated V Corps on the Union right which had crossed the river at Jericho Mill. After a bloody see-saw fight, the Federal bridgehead remained intact. On the Union left, Maj. Gen. Winfield Hancock's II Corps seized the Chesterfield Bridge over the North Anna. On May 24, an attack by a brigade from the IX Corps was repulsed at Ox Ford, the apex of Lee's line. Meanwhile, Hancock advanced on the Confederate right. Lee hoped to strike an offensive blow, but the opportunity for defeating an isolated part of the Federal army had passed. Grant outflanked the position by moving downstream to the east and continued his advance on Richmond.