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We
are working as partners in conjunction with Gettysburg Relics to offer
some very nice American Civil War relics for sale. The owner of
Gettysburg Relics was the proprietor of Artifact at 777 on Cemetery Hill
in Gettysburg for a number of years, and we are now selling on eBay.
THE SIEGE OF PETERSBURG, VIRGINIA ~ THE BATTLE OF WELDON RAILROAD (ALSO KNOWN AS THE BATTLE OF GLOBE TAVERN) ~ This great Civil War relic, a brass roller buckle with central frame and one intact prong and a second broken prong, could be a spur buckle, or shoe buckle and it has been confirmed that these have been found on binocular straps by collectors. A delicate brass roller buckle, measuring about 1" by 1 1/16".
The Battle of Weldon Railroad
'After failing to bludgeon his way into Petersburg in June and July, Grant decided to strangle the city instead. His plan: cut the railroads into Petersburg – cut the Confederate’s lifelines.
On August 18, Maj. Gen. Gouverneur Warren’s Union Fifth Corps seized the Petersburg & Weldon Railroad here near Globe Tavern. The Confederates retaliated, but after three days of fighting, the Union grip on the railroad remained unshaken.
The Federals (facing north) fought from earthworks on August 21. The works shown here stood just a few yards south of (behind) you. The Buck House, on the left of the painting, was dismantled during the construction of Fort Wadsworth a few weeks later.
August 19: Confederates under Maj. Gen. William Mahone demolished Warren’s right – east of the railroad – and captured 2,500 Federals. Only timely reinforcements prevented Union disaster.
Two days later, after Warren had pulled back and entrenched around Globe Tavern, the Confederates attacked again. This time the Federals repulsed them easily – and bloodily.'
'In the Second Battle of Weldon Railroad (or the Battle of Globe Tavern), the Union Army attempted to capture the railroad again following its failed June effort.
Before dawn on August 18, Grant sent his Fifth Corps, commanded by General Gouverneur K. Warren, westward with orders to destroy a section of track and hold it if he could. Warren’s men left heated rails twisted in the shape of the Maltese Cross, Fifth Corps’ insignia, in their wake before withstanding a fierce counterattack from three Confederate brigades led by General Henry Heth.
The next day, Mahone’s division (the same that had thwarted the Union’s first attempt at destroying the rail line), sliced between Warren’s right flank and the left of General John Parke’s Ninth Corps, inflicting another embarrassing tactical defeat on the Federals.
All told over the four-day battle, the Federals suffered 4,279 casualties and had more than 2,500 men taken prisoner, yet they managed to destroy enough track to force the Confederates to transport their supplies 30 miles by wagon to bypass new Union lines to the south and the west.'
'Major General Gouverneur K. Warren led his Fifth Corps west from the Union lines located south of Petersburg on a steamy August 18. His lead division reached the railroad around Globe Tavern about nine o’clock in the morning and began to destroy the tracks, opposed only by a weak body of cavalry. General P. G. T. Beauregard, the ranking Confederate officer at Petersburg while Lee directed affairs north of the James, sent three infantry brigades early in the afternoon to dislodge Warren. The Confederate attacks halted Warren’s advance up the railroad but did not drive him away.
Warren deployed his entire corps to cover the railroad, leaving a gap between his right flank and the established Union lines to the east. Into that gap on August 19 plunged three Confederate brigades led by Major General William Mahone, while more Confederates pressed Warren’s front. Mahone smashed one Fifth Corps division and pressed the next one in line until reinforcements from the Union Ninth Corps halted Mahone’s progress. The Confederates captured more than 2,500 enemy soldiers on August 19 and killed or wounded nearly four hundred more, but their victory fell short of recovering the critical railroad.
Confederate generals Beauregard and A. P. Hill immediately laid plans to accomplish that goal. They spent August 20 preparing their offensive, providing Warren the opportunity to adopt a strong defensive posture. The Confederate assaults on the morning of August 21 met with disaster. A South Carolina brigade, led by Brigadier General Johnson Hagood, unwittingly stumbled into a cul-de-sac of fire, losing more than half of its men. The fighting ended by noon with a Confederate withdrawal to the Petersburg defenses.
The Aftermath
Grant hoped Warren would exploit his victory, but the Fifth Corps commander seemed content to hold his ground. Warren had inflicted between 1,600 and 2,300 casualties during the three days of fighting while absorbing 4,279 of his own, two-thirds of them prisoners.
Union troops quickly fortified the gap between the railroad and their old lines. Grant’s efforts to expand destruction of the tracks to the south ended with defeat at the Battle of Reams Station on August 25, but Union troops would control the Petersburg (Weldon) Railroad for the remainder of the campaign. Lee now had no choice but to offload his supplies from North Carolina at the Stony Creek station, eighteen miles south of Petersburg, and transfer them by wagon to Dinwiddie Court House and then up the Boydton Plank Road into Petersburg. This new, less-efficient supply line became the target of Grant’s fifth offensive at Petersburg in September.'
The
digger began metal detecting in 1971 and was always careful to store
his artifacts so that the find location was documented. I acquired this
relic directly from the digger. A provenance letter with the digger's name (he is still living) will be included.
All
of the collections that we are offering for sale are guaranteed to be
authentic, and are either older recoveries, found before the 1960s when
it was still legal to metal detect battlefields, or were recovered on
private property with permission. Land on Battlefields that is now
Federally owned, or owned by the Trust, was acquired after the relics
were recovered. We will not buy or sell any items that were recovered
illegally, nor will we sell any items that we suspect were recovered
illegally.
We include as much documentation with the relics as we possess. This includes a signed letter of provenance with the specific recovery information.