On the 8th of May, just after the battle of the Wilderness and when we were moving on Spottsylvania I directed Sheridan verbally to cut loose from the Army of the Potomac, pass around the left of Lee’s army and attack his cavalry:  to cut the two roads—­one running west through Gordonsville, Charlottesville and Lynchburg, the other to Richmond, and, when compelled to do so for want of forage and rations, to move on to the James River and draw these from Butler’s supplies.  This move took him past the entire rear of Lee’s army.  These orders were also given in writing through Meade.

The object of this move was three-fold.  First, if successfully executed, and it was, he would annoy the enemy by cutting his line of supplies and telegraphic communications, and destroy or get for his own use supplies in store in the rear and coming up.  Second, he would draw the enemy’s cavalry after him, and thus better protect our flanks, rear and trains than by remaining with the army.  Third, his absence would save the trains drawing his forage and other supplies from Fredericksburg, which had now become our base.  He started at daylight the next morning, and accomplished more than was expected.  It was sixteen days before he got back to the Army of the Potomac.

The course Sheridan took was directly to Richmond.  Before night Stuart, commanding the Confederate cavalry, came on to the rear of his command.  But the advance kept on, crossed the North Anna, and at Beaver Dam, a station on the Virginia Central Railroad, recaptured four hundred Union prisoners on their way to Richmond, destroyed the road and used and destroyed a large amount of subsistence and medical stores.

Stuart, seeing that our cavalry was pushing towards Richmond, abandoned the pursuit on the morning of the 10th and, by a detour and an exhausting march, interposed between Sheridan and Richmond at Yellow Tavern, only about six miles north of the city.  Sheridan destroyed the railroad and more supplies at Ashland, and on the 11th arrived in Stuart’s front.  A severe engagement ensued in which the losses were heavy on both sides, but the rebels were beaten, their leader mortally wounded, and some guns and many prisoners were captured.

Sheridan passed through the outer defences of Richmond, and could, no doubt, have passed through the inner ones.  But having no supports near he could not have remained.  After caring for his wounded he struck for the James River below the city, to communicate with Butler and to rest his men and horses as well as to get food and forage for them.

He moved first between the Chickahominy and the James, but in the morning (the 12th) he was stopped by batteries at Mechanicsville.  He then turned to cross to the north side of the Chickahominy by Meadow Bridge.  He found this barred, and the defeated Confederate cavalry, reorganized, occupying the opposite side.  The panic created by his first entrance within the outer works of Richmond having subsided troops were sent out to attack his rear.