U. S. GRANT, Lieut.-General.

Lee replied on the evening of the same day as follows: 

April 7, 1865.

GENERAL:  I have received your note of this day.  Though not entertaining the opinion you express on the hopelessness of further resistance on the part of the Army of Northern Virginia, I reciprocate your desire to avoid useless effusion of blood, and therefore before considering your proposition, ask the terms you will offer on condition of its surrender.

R. E. LEE, General.

LIEUT.-GENERAL U. S. GRANT, Commanding Armies of the U. S.

This was not satisfactory, but I regarded it as deserving another letter and wrote him as follows: 

April 8, 1865.

GENERAL R. E. LEE, Commanding C. S. A.

Your note of last evening in reply to mine of same date, asking the condition on which I will accept the surrender of the Army of Northern Virginia is just received.  In reply I would say that, peace being my great desire, there is but one condition I would insist upon, namely:  that the men and officers surrendered shall be disqualified for taking up arms again against the Government of the United States until properly exchanged.  I will meet you, or will designate officers to meet any officers you may name for the same purpose, at any point agreeable to you, for the purpose of arranging definitely the terms upon which the surrender of the Army of Northern Virginia will be received.

U. S. GRANT, Lieut.-General.

Lee’s army was rapidly crumbling.  Many of his soldiers had enlisted from that part of the State where they now were, and were continually dropping out of the ranks and going to their homes.  I know that I occupied a hotel almost destitute of furniture at Farmville, which had probably been used as a Confederate hospital.  The next morning when I came out I found a Confederate colonel there, who reported to me and said that he was the proprietor of that house, and that he was a colonel of a regiment that had been raised in that neighborhood.  He said that when he came along past home, he found that he was the only man of the regiment remaining with Lee’s army, so he just dropped out, and now wanted to surrender himself.  I told him to stay there and he would not be molested.  That was one regiment which had been eliminated from Lee’s force by this crumbling process.

Although Sheridan had been marching all day, his troops moved with alacrity and without any straggling.  They began to see the end of what they had been fighting four years for.  Nothing seemed to fatigue them.  They were ready to move without rations and travel without rest until the end.  Straggling had entirely ceased, and every man was now a rival for the front.  The infantry marched about as rapidly as the cavalry could.

Sheridan sent Custer with his division to move south of Appomattox Station, which is about five miles south-west of the Court House, to get west of the trains and destroy the roads to the rear.  They got there the night of the 8th, and succeeded partially; but some of the train men had just discovered the movement of our troops and succeeded in running off three of the trains.  The other four were held by Custer.