On the next day, the 1st of April, a more determined struggle ensued, for the possession of Five Forks, where Lee had stationed the small remnants of the divisions of Pickett and Johnson.  These made a brave resistance, but were wholly unable to stand before the force brought against them.  They maintained their ground as long as possible, but were finally broken to pieces and scattered in confusion, the whole right of the Confederate line and the Southside Road falling into the hands of the enemy.

[Illustration:  Lee at Petersburg]

This was virtually the end of the contest, but General Grant, it would appear, deemed it inexpedient to venture any thing.  So thinly manned were the lines in front of Petersburg, in the absence of Longstreet north of James River, and the troops sent beyond Hatcher’s Run, that on the 1st of April the Federal commander might have broken through the works at almost any point.  He elected to wait, however, until the following day, thereby running the risk of awaking to find that Lee had retreated.

At dawn on the 2d the long struggle ended.  The Federal forces advanced all along the Confederate front, made a furious attack, and, breaking through in front of the city, carried all before them.  The forts, especially Fort Gregg, made a gallant resistance.  This work was defended by the two hundred and fifty men of Harris’s Mississippi Brigade, and these fought until their numbers were reduced to thirty, killing or wounding five hundred of the assailants.  The fort was taken at last, and the Federal lines advanced toward the city.  In this attack fell the eminent soldier General A.P.  Hill, whose record had been so illustrious, and whose fortune it was to thus terminate his life while the Southern flag still floated.

XV.

LEE EVACUATES PETERSBURG.

Any further resistance upon the part of General Lee seemed now impossible, and nothing appeared to be left him but to surrender his army.  This course he does not seem, however, to have contemplated.  It was still possible that he might be able to maintain his position on an inner line near the city until night; and, if he could do so, the friendly hours of darkness might enable him to make good his retreat to the north bank of the Appomattox, and shape his course toward North Carolina, where General Johnston awaited him.  If the movements of the Federal forces, however, were so prompt as to defeat his march in that direction, he might still be able to reach Lynchburg, beyond which point the defiles of the Alleghanies promised him protection against the utmost efforts of his enemy.  Of his ability to reach North Carolina, following the line of the Danville Railroad, Lee, however, seems to have had no doubt.  The Federal army would not probably be able to concentrate in sufficient force in his path to bar his progress if his march were rapid; if detached bodies only opposed him on his line of retreat, there was little doubt that the Army of Northern Virginia, reduced as it was, would be able to cut its way through them.