The Battle of Dinwiddie Court House, March 31, 1865
The rain had not stopped in days.
It poured from the gray March sky like the heavens themselves were mourning the death of a nation. The roads were slop, the fields rivers of churned clay and hoofprints, and yet the blue columns of Union cavalry under Major General Philip Sheridan pressed westward, their oilcloth ponchos clinging like second skins. Dinwiddie Court House lay just ahead — five miles south of Five Forks, a crossroads cradling the fate of Robert E. Lee’s army.
Sheridan knew what was at stake. If Five Forks fell, the last supply lifeline — the Southside Railroad — would be severed. And the Army of Northern Virginia, already thin and hungry, would bleed out in place.
By the afternoon of March 29th, Sheridan and his 10,000 troopers arrived at Dinwiddie, mud-slick and saddle-sore but unopposed. It was a critical foothold. He could see the end coming — if he had infantry support, he believed he could drive through the right flank of Lee’s lines, tear through Five Forks, and break the noose around Richmond.
But General George Pickett, recently detached from Longstreet’s 1st Corps, had other plans.
By dawn on the 31st, Pickett had gathered a patchwork army — veteran Virginia brigades under Terry, Corse, and Steuart; Carolinians under Wallace and Ransom; and Fitzhugh Lee’s cavalry, riding hard into the muck. Pickett meant to strike first — and hard — to drive Sheridan back and reclaim the initiative.
The Storm Breaks
As the morning mist rose like steam from the soaked fields, Fitzhugh Lee’s cavalry led the way south down the Scott Road. At Fitzgerald’s Ford, the first clash came hard and fast.
Brigadier General Rufus Barringer’s North Carolinians met a blue wall of fire — repeating carbines of Brevet Brigadier General Charles Smith’s brigade, men of the 2nd New York Mounted Rifles, dug in along Chamberlain’s Bed Creek. Their weapons spat death in steady rhythm, but numbers told. Barringer forced his way across, was thrown back, then returned with Beale’s Virginians, this time driving the Federals from the crossing in a crashing wave of horses and muskets.
Meanwhile, farther upstream at Danse’s Ford, the Federals were even more exposed. With most of Henry Davies’ brigade diverted to support Smith, only Major Walter Robbins and a few companies of 1st New Jersey Cavalryremained to guard the ford.
Suddenly, through the woods and fog, emerged the bulk of Pickett’s infantry. Corse’s Virginians stormed the banks. Robbins’ men fired, fell back, and broke. Davies returned too late to hold the line — the Confederates surged across the ford in force.
The Blue Line Shatters
The situation rapidly deteriorated. Union brigades, one after the other, were shoved back. Colonel Peter Stagg’s Michigan Brigade and Colonel Charles Fitzhugh’s New Yorkers tried to hold the Dinwiddie Court House Road, but they were outnumbered nearly 3 to 1. They fought stubbornly — rallied again and again — but were broken in a powerful Confederate assault led by Corse, Terry, and Munford’s cavalry.
Stagg’s and Fitzhugh’s men streamed back toward J. Boisseau’s Farm, where Davies was trying to reform his shattered brigade. Even Sheridan admitted later they had come within a whisker of collapse.
Yet Sheridan wasn’t finished.
He ordered Brigadier General John Irvin Gregg and Brigadier General Alfred Gibbs to strike back — not head-on, but flank and rear. These two brigades struck like lightning at the Confederate columns, distracting them, forcing Pickett to pivot, and giving Sheridan time.
The Line Holds at Nightfall
Now came the moment of reckoning.
With his flanks crumbling and his front disordered, Sheridan summoned his last card: Custer.
The golden-haired general came thundering onto the field with Colonel Alexander Pennington’s and Colonel Henry Capehart’s brigades, forming a battle line just north of Dinwiddie Court House. The remnants of Smith, Gregg, and Gibbs joined them, forming a patchwork line of mud-spattered survivors. They found what cover they could — fence rails, stumps, muddy gullies — and braced for the final blow.
Dusk fell with a whisper, and the woods echoed with the Rebel yell.
Pickett’s infantry came on again, fierce and hungry. They hit Pennington’s advanced pickets — the 3rd New Jersey and 2nd Ohio — and drove them back. But as they reached the main line, the Federals opened up with withering fire. Repeaters barked and flamed. Twice Pickett charged — and twice he was driven back.
Rooney Lee, Rosser, and Munford launched one last cavalry charge against Smith’s exhausted brigade, who stood their ground despite being out of cartridges, fighting with empty rifles and cold steel.
Then, out of the gloom, Custer emerged, sword raised, golden sash flapping. He led Capehart’s Brigade in a thunderous mounted charge — sabers flashing, horses crashing through the darkened field. The Confederate line broke.
It was chaos. In the blackness, neither side could see beyond a few yards. The guns barked at shadows. Men yelled challenges into the night, unaware whether the figures around them were friend or foe.
And then, at last, silence.
At 9pm, Pickett, realizing his entire force was on the verge of being cut off from Lee’s army, pulled back under cover of darkness to Five Forks, bloodied, battered — and beaten.
Aftermath
In the wet morning stillness of April 1st, the Federals held Dinwiddie Court House.
Sheridan had taken a pounding, but not broken. And now, with infantry reinforcements on the way and Pickett exposed, the time had come to strike.
Of the 10,000 troopers Sheridan brought to Dinwiddie, 354 were casualties — dead, wounded, missing. Pickett’s command suffered at least 760.
But more important than the numbers was the outcome.
Pickett had gambled and failed. His men had been drawn out of their entrenchments. Sheridan still blocked the road to the Southside Railroad. And the Confederate position at Five Forks, isolated and weakened, was ripe for the taking.
Sheridan said it plainly:
“This force [Pickett’s] is in more danger than I am... We have drawn the enemy’s infantry out of its fortifications, and this is our chance to attack it.”
