The Appomatox Campaign and The Battle of Appomatox

• The Appomatox Campaign lasted from March 29 (The Battle of Five Forks) to April 9, 1865. (NPS)

• The Battle at the Appomatox Court House was the defining battle of the campaign, since it effectively began the end of the war, with Lee's surrender there.

• The Battle of Appomatox began at 8:00 in the morning on April 9, 1865, when 9,000 Union soldiers surrounded General Lee in the village of Appomatox, Virginia. (CWT)

• General Ulysses S. Grant (the Union commander) was trying to cut off and destroy General Robert E. Lee's (the Confederate commander) army. (CWT)

• Lee's goal had been to escape,  and make his way south to first get his supplies at Lynchburg, VA (Battle Summary), and then "link up with Johnston in North Carolina" (Brinkley), but after his army's resistance efforts proved less than fruitful, he decided upon a tactical retreat towards the Appomatox River, eventually surrendering his army in favor of losing even more of his men. (CWT)

• The battle ended somewhere between 10:00 and 11:00 that same morning, when Lee's army surrendered bit by bit, leaving the Union victorious. (CWT)

• Lee's surrender "set the stage" for the end of the war, as the Confederate soldiers were allowed to go home, amid the shame put upon them by the Union soldiers who had been told not to taunt them too much. (CWT)