Battle of the Wilderness

"Go back to your command, and try to think what we are going to do ourselves, instead of what Lee is going to do." (Grant, on the night of 6 May, to an officer alarmed that the Union right had collapsed; as recalled by Horace Porter) Do you leave the road? Nine-tenths of this board is forest. A year earlier, just to the east of these same woods, Hooker was beaten at Chancellorsville. Second-growth trees and thickets shrink the view to a few dozen yards, and troops who leave the road advance only two hexes a turn. Two roads run east and west: the Orange Turnpike in the north and the Orange Plank Road in the south. The Brock Road runs north and south along the east edge, joining their eastern ends. At noon on 5 May the Union army, just across the Rapidan, has run into the Confederates in the woods. In the north, Warren's V Corps has found Ewell's corps beyond the open field of Saunders Field; in the south, Getty's division has reached the crossroads of the Brock and Plank Roads a step ahead of Hill's corps. Hancock's II Corps is coming up the Brock Road from the south in column. [How the Union wins] You may activate 16 units per turn. You begin holding the crossroads (30 points) and Wilderness Tavern (10). The Widow Tapp farm (20; Lee's headquarters and Poague's guns), Saunders Field (10) and Parker's Store (10) are on the Confederate side. The victory line is 0: a Union score margin above 0 is a win. At T5 (dawn on the 6th), IX Corps (Burnside) arrives on the Germanna road from the north. [How the Confederates win] You may activate 14 units per turn. Hill's corps is thin and did not entrench during the night. At T6 to T7, Longstreet's First Corps arrives on the Plank Road from the west, and part of it (Mahone, Wofford, G.T. Anderson) through the cut of the unfinished railroad to the south. The cut is one of the few roads in the forest that let you move sideways. [Commanders] Union: Grant / Meade / V Corps: Warren, Griffin, Ayres (Regulars), Bartlett, Wadsworth (mortally wounded on the 6th), Cutler (Iron Brigade), Rice, Crawford, Robinson / VI Corps: Sedgwick, Wright, Upton, Seymour (captured on the evening of the 6th), Shaler (likewise), Ricketts, Getty, Wheaton, L.A. Grant (Vermont Brigade) / II Corps: Hancock, Birney, Mott, A. Hays (killed on the 5th), Gibbon, Barlow, Webb, Carroll / IX Corps: Burnside, Potter, Willcox, Stevenson. Confederate: Lee / Poague's guns (Poague) / Second Corps: Ewell, J.M. Jones (killed on the 5th), Steuart, the Stonewall Brigade (Walker), Stafford (mortally wounded), Battle, Doles, Daniel, Ramseur, Gordon, Pegram, Hays / Third Corps: A.P. Hill, Heth, Kirkland, Cooke, Davis, H.H. Walker, Wilcox, Lane, Scales, McGowan, Thomas / First Corps: Longstreet (badly wounded by his own men on the 6th), the Texas Brigade (Gregg), Law's Brigade (Perry), Benning, Kershaw, Humphreys, Wofford, Mahone, G.T. Anderson. [Decisions this board lets you try] - (Union) At dawn (T5), do you push along the Plank Road? Hill's corps will break, but Longstreet is coming beyond it. - (Union) Do you put IX Corps between the two roads (Chewning Farm) to split the Confederates, or send it along the roads? - (Confederate) Do you feed Longstreet's men straight up the Plank Road, or swing them round through the cut? - (Confederate) Do you use Gordon at nightfall to turn the far Union right? [Outcome] At dawn on the 6th Hancock pushed along the Plank Road and broke Hill's corps. In the Widow Tapp field Lee tried to lead the newly arrived Texans himself, and the men took his horse's bridle, crying "Lee to the rear!" At eleven, Longstreet's men came through the cut and rolled up Hancock's left, and the Union line was driven back to the breastworks on the Brock Road. Soon afterwards Longstreet was shot by his own men, and the attack stalled. In the evening, at the northern end, Gordon turned the Union right, and Seymour and Shaler were taken prisoner. The woods caught fire, and the flames ran over wounded men who could not move. The Union lost some 17,000, the Confederates some 11,000. On the night of the 7th, Grant's army did not retreat north but turned south towards Spotsylvania. When the soldiers understood, it is said, they cheered on the dark road. 　　Off the road, no one could walk more than two hexes 　　Lee to the rear, the soldiers said 　　Only those who went through the cut could turn a flank 　　The woods burned, and two days passed 　　Not what Lee would do, but what we would do 　　The army turned not north, but south On both sides brigades and divisions are gathered into mixed units. The night of the 5th is skipped by a mark on the clock (after T4 = 18:00 on the 5th comes T5 = 5:00 on the 6th). Most of the small clearings in the forest are folded away; only the named fields remain. 1 hex = 250 m, 1 turn = 2 hours, 1 CS = about 1,200 men. T1 = 5 May 12:00, T4 = 18:00, T5 = 6 May 5:00 (dawn attack), T6 = 7:00 (Longstreet), T8 = 11:00 (flank attack through the cut), T12 = 19:00 (Gordon).