474 



A HISTORY OF CAVALRY. 



[period v. 



1 



¥ 'J 



attributed to the utter exhaustion of the Confederacy 

 at that late period of the struggle. It is certainly, 

 however, one of the most extraordinary affairs in the 

 history of the cavalry service, and almost recalls the 

 romantic episodes of the Crusades, where the armies 

 consisted almost solely of knights, who dismounted to 

 attack fortified places. It is a striking Olustration of 

 what can be done by the judicious use of a force of 

 mounted riflemen, if bravely led and skilfully com- 

 manded. 



We shall conclude the references to the operations 

 of the horsemen in the American Civil War with an 

 account of one of the most important services ever per- 

 formed by a body of cavalry in modern times. The 

 operations of Sheridan's corps of mounted riflemen in 

 the spring of 1865 in the neighbourhood of I'etersburg 

 and Kichmond, operations which virtually exercised 

 a controlling influence upon the fate of the war, and 

 secured the evacuation of Richmond and the ultimate 

 surrender of Lee's army, will well repay the careful 

 study of the cavalry officer. 



For four years a succession of Northern armies, led by 

 a succession of their best generals, had made unceasing 

 efforts to capture the capital of the Confederacy. They 

 had arrived within sight of it once before, only to be 

 hurled back in utter rout with fearful losses. In almost 

 every great battle the Southerners had been victorious, 

 the generalship of their commanders and the bravery 

 and steadiness of their men being superior to that of 

 their opponents. Time brings queer changes, and it 

 was the sad fate of the Southern people to succumb 

 to a system of tactics which they themselves had 

 originated, but which their assailants had perfected and 

 employed upon a more extensive scale. 



Grant had fought his way to his position to the south 

 of Petersburg, where, with a close and secure base at 

 City Point, he was able to feed without difficulty his 

 immensely superior army ; and was carrying out his 

 policy of wearing out the Southern cause by the " mere 

 attrition" of constant hammering at their fines. From 



