The 1st Maine Heavy Artillery Regiment in the Civil War

On the afternoon of June 18th, 1864, on a farm field outside Petersburg, Virginia, approximately 900 men of the 1st Maine Heavy Artillery Regiment stepped up from behind the cover of a sunken road, formed in three lines, and began an assault against a fortified Confederate position. The attack lasted just ten minutes and when it was over, a staggering 632 men were casualties, including 210 killed or mortally wounded. It was the largest single action loss in battle of any Union Army regiment in the Civil War.

The 1st Maine Heavy Artillery was formed in August 1862 as an infantry regiment, the 18th Maine Volunteer Infantry. The regiment was sent to Washington D.C. and was put to work building and occupying the defensive fortifications of the city. In January of 1863, the unit was renamed the 1st Maine Heavy Artillery and was expanded from the usual ten companies of 100 men each for a typical infantry regiment to an enrollment of 12 companies of 150 men or 1800 total.. As the war went on, the men of the 1st Maine continued the relatively safe duty of tending to the big siege guns and cannon of Washington's forts.

Off to the Front

All that changed in the spring of 1864. In early May, the Union's Army of the Potomac embarked on a new campaign and suffered thousands of casualties in the Battles of the Wilderness and Spottsylvania Court House in Virginia. Lt. General Ulysses S. Grant ordered five of the heavy artillery regiments to the front as reinforcements, and the 1st Maine Heavy Artillery left Washington on May 15th, joining the army near Spottsylvania, where they were assigned to Major General Winfield S. Hancock's Second Corps. Although it retained the designation as a Heavy Artillery regiment, the 1st Maine would fight as infantry for the rest of the war.

Near Spottsylvania Court House May 19th, 1864

On May 19th, the 1st Maine and 7th New York Heavy Artillery regiments were ordered to attack Confederate forces that threatened the Second Corps' supply wagon trains. Arriving on the scene, the 1st Maine formed in line of battle by company and commenced firing for well over two hours. Many on the line were standing completely exposed, but methodically loaded their muskets, aimed, and fired.

The Confederates were finally driven from the field after more Union troops arrived. The fighting had taken a tremendous toll on the 1st Maine: 155 killed or mortally wounded and 369 wounded. One of the wounded men, Private Charles J. House, recalled later that if the regiment had not advanced as far forward as they had, they would have been able to fire from partial cover; or if they had simply hit the ground instead of standing up the whole time, they would have come away with a lot fewer casualties.

House returned to the battlefield that night and described the scene. "I noticed eight or ten of our men laid out side by side, the beams of the moon struggling through the fleecy clouds, lighting their upturned faces all smeared with the smoke of battle, some showing gaping wounds, and all ghastly and lifeless". The 1st Maine's total loss of 524 casualties in this action of May 19th was the highest that any one Union regiment had suffered in one engagement in the war up to that point.

It would get worse.

Petersburg, Virginia June 18th, 1864

Grant continued to drive further south, clashing with General Robert E. Lee's Confederate army at several points. The Union Army crossed the James River in mid June and was outside Petersburg on June 15th. Grant wanted to take Petersburg before Lee could reinforce the city, but attacks over the next two days failed to do so, and Confederate defenders moved into the city's defensive earthworks. Grant decided to make one more attempt to take the city by storm on June 18th.

By the time the 1st Maine was ordered forward, several Union attacks on the Confederate lines had ended in failure. The 1st Maine's brigade commander, Brigadier General Gershom Mott argued against another assault, believing it to be a hopeless undertaking. But the order stood, and the 1st Maine formed in three lines of four companies each. They were to lead the attack, with other units following in support. At 4:30 in the afternoon, the 1st Maine stepped off from the Prince George Court House Road and advanced towards the Confederate lines some 350 yards away.

The 1st Maine was soon hit with musket and artillery fire. Private Joel Brown recalled "I saw the works plainly before me. I saw the blinding flash of red flame run along the crest of those works and heard the deafening crash as the awful work began." The supporting units also advanced, but soon realized the attack would end in failure. These were veterans who had been through other futile frontal assaults during the war, and they quickly withdrew to cover. The barrage of musket and artillery fire was now concentrated on the 1st Maine alone. As more and more men went down, the others saw that it was almost certain death to continue and turned back. Brown remembered that on the desperate withdrawal the ground was "covered thick with those who were down, the wounded, dead and dying together. How I ever got back I cannot tell". In ten minutes (and one survivor estimated the attack as lasting just four minutes), 632 men had become casualties and nothing had been gained.

Between May 19th and June 18th, the First Maine Heavy Artillery had sustained 1,179 casualties. This includes a small number of casualties in actions that occurred between the two major battles. The regiment continued to serve until the end of the war, and finished with a total of 423 killed out of an enrollment of 2,202. It was the greatest number killed of any Union regiment in the Civil War.

Sources

Brown, Joel F. "The Charge of the Heavy Artillery", Maine Bugle, January 1894.

Coates, Earl J. "The Bloody First Maine", Civil War Times Illustrated, Volume XI, Number 4, July 1972.

Dyer, Frederick. A Compendium of the War of the Rebellion. Des Moines, Iowa: Dyer Publishing Co., 1908.

Fox, William F. Regimental Strengths and Losses in the American Civil War 1861-1865. Albany, New York: Albany Publishing Co., 1889.

House , Charles J. "How the First Maine Heavy Artillery Lost 1179 Men in 30 Days", Maine Bugle, April 1895.

Howe, Thomas J. Wasted Valor June 15-18, 1864. Lynchburg, Virginia: H.E. Howard, Inc. 1988.

Shaw, Horace. The First Maine Heavy Artillery. Portland, Maine, 1903.

Trudeau, Noah Andre. The Last Citadel. Boston: Little, Brown, and Co., 1991.