disorder, and the advance was discontinued.  General Lee, as soon as he was apprised of the accident, hastened to take personal command of the corps, and, as soon as order was restored, directed the line to press forward.  The most bloody and determined struggle of the day ensued.  The thicket filled the valleys, and, as at Chancellorsville, a new horror was added to the horror of battle.  A fire broke out in the thicket, and soon wrapped the adversaries in flame and smoke.  They fought on, however, amid the crackling flames.  Lee continued to press forward; the Federal breastworks along a portion of their front were carried, and a part of General Hancock’s line was driven from the field.  The struggle had, however, been decisive of no important results, and, from the lateness of the hour when it terminated, it could not be followed up.  On the left Lee had also met with marked but equally indecisive success.  General Gordon had attacked the Federal right, driven the force at that point in disorder from their works, and but for the darkness this success might have been followed up and turned into a complete defeat of that wing of the enemy.  It was only discovered on the next morning what important successes Gordon had effected with a single brigade; and there is reason to believe that with a larger force this able soldier might have achieved results of a decisive character.[1]

[Footnote 1:  General Early, in his “Memoir of the Last Year of the War for Independence,” bears his testimony to the important character of the blow struck by General Gordon.  He says:  “At light, on the morning of the 7th, an advance was made, which disclosed the fact that the enemy had given up his line of works in front of my whole line and a good portion of Johnson’s.  Between the lines a large number of his dead had been left, and at his breastworks a large number of muskets and knapsacks had been abandoned, and there was every indication of great confusion.  It was not till then that we understood the full extent of the success attending the movement of the evening before.”  General Gordon had proposed making the attack on the morning of the 6th, but was overruled.]

Such had been the character and results of the first conflicts between the two armies in the thickets of the Wilderness.  As we have already said, the collision there was neither expected nor desired by General Grant, who, unlike General Hooker, in May of the preceding year, seems fully to have understood the unfavorable nature of the region for manoeuvring a large army.  His adversary had, however, forced him to accept battle, leaving him no choice, and the result of the actions of the 5th and 6th had been such as to determine the Federal commander to emerge as soon as possible from the tangled underwood which hampered all his movements.  On the 7th he accordingly made no movement to attack Lee, and on the night of that day marched rapidly in the direction of Hanover Junction, following the road by Todd’s Tavern toward Spottsylvania Court-House.