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Please understand that this poem is an
excerpt from a full length biography in
verse of Robert E. Lee. Therefore, some of the
names may not be familiar to those of you
who are not students of
The War Between the States.

The Siege of Petersburg

Black were the hearts, and gray the days,
Now wrapped in Federal blue!
Hungry the nights and thick the haze,
Surrounded by Federal blue!

But General Lee it did not faze,
As up he'd high those colors raise

And bite the blues in two!

Though all the South the North might raze,
Grant would Lee amaze!

With half the staff and fewer the men
Than General Grant could field,
Greater the words than ink can pen
Of spine so tempered and steeled!

With fewer guns of inferior yield,
With inferior ranks of exhausted men,
On Lee did the South depend.
And so Marse Robert did intend
That Petersburg be sealed.

And thus it was, and thus remained,
Through all the harrowing days;
And Lee was tightly there enchained
To opposing blues and grays.


And off in the Valley
Early would rally
His men to Washington's door;
Then back the Yanks would come to sally,
And then back to the Valley floor.

How the Northern hope would rally
When Sheridan rode into the Valley!

Early's corps would be crushed
As southward ever the Yankees rushed,
Destroying crop and field.

Above Atlanta would Johnston yield
To Sherman's superiority,
But the General's will was still annealed
By clearly ordered priority.

How is it the lyrics go?
Nothing could be finer
Than a Pennsylvania miner?

However those lyrics go,
Of these, Grant had a regiment
Who'd dug and mined for coal;
Who now would pay a heavy toll
As he authorized their grim intent
To dig a fiery hole.

No Yank disaster was later greater
Than the affair of Bloody Crater!

For a month there came from under the ground
A barely discernible thumping sound,
A faintly audible bumping sound
From under Elliott's brigade.

The Rebels knew what the thumping meant,
And counter-mined to prevent
The success of that escapade.

Though the holes were many they never did meet
Anywhere under the ground;
Still there came that tapping sound,
That incessant tapping, rapping sound
Beneath old Elliott's feet.

It seemed the Rebs could not unseat
The Yanks from underground.

Two months before Atlanta fell
There came to Virginia visions of hell
As the Petersburg lines exploded!

Elliott's ranks were much eroded
When under his feet the earth exploded,
Leaving a crater of smoking blood!

And Oh, the sound of that heavy thud
Was heard for miles around
When deep it burst from 'neath the ground,
A rising crescendo of hammering sound
That Rebel hope corroded!

But General Lee still controlled
His men and the situation;

Even as Yankee infantry rolled
Into that cratered devastation,
Lee was sending Mahone's brigades
To the hole in his fortification.

Quickly, thundering cannonades
Fell on the pitiful Yank brigades
Trapped in that conflagration!

Then up the walls the Yankees scaled
As o'erhead artillery screeched and wailed
And a volley of Rebel bullets hailed
Down onto the advancing Yank!

Lee called men from either flank
To charge into that yawning hole,

Where Yankees poured, and raised their pole
And flag on Confederate works,
Not knowing that mortal danger lurks
When you pull the tail of an eagle!

For there the General was almost regal
In proud military bearing!

His outer calm, beyond comparing,
Grappled with his inner daring
As he longed to charge into the hole!

But General Lee was a soldier whole,
And knew he must be forbearing;
Let his men take care of the hole.

And so he did, and so did they,
In a bloody eight hour day.

Up to the rim the Rebels ran --
The rim of the crater, wide and deep!
And over the top went gun and man,
And down those walls so steep!

There the men of that stalwart band
Followed the General's every command,
That cratered symbol to keep!

The fight was raging, hand to hand,
Contesting the tiny spot of land;

Where the Yankees heard the Reaper calling
As hard on their front the Rebs were falling
With gun-butt and bayonet!

The fray was enthralling and the Rebs were mauling
Those Yanks who would never forget
The battle at the bloody Crater,
No matter the victories later.

And then the fight was over,
And Lee and his men were sober
Despite the swelling cheers
That assaulted their weary ears.



Now, the long gray track of tears --
From here on out the Yank prevails
In the cutting of Rebel rails;

From here on out are sore travails
Upon the king of the engineers.

Captured rails meant no supplies --
No blankets or food to meet the cries
Of those who stared with empty eyes,
With loving, hungry, trusting eyes
At the General who still must lead them,
Who somehow still must feed them.

Oh, those brightly gleaming rails
That Grant now savagely assails,
Heaping despair upon travails!

Now comes the bitterest winter yet
That anyone can recall,
Hard on the heels of a bitterer fall
Than anyone can forget!

Hunger honed its beak and claw
In that winter of desperation;

Waited to gorge its gaping craw
On that harvest of deprivation,
Ere the freeze would turn to thaw!

Terribly Marse Robert hurried,
And wearily he scurried
In search of food and supplies.

His faith was waxing great,
As great as the many eyes
That hungrily watched in wait --

And the General never wavered,
Nor let himself be favored
When his men would've filled his plate
With their own diminished provision!

He met with acute precision
Every attempted Union revision
Of the ownership of that field.

And when that winter revealed
In such succinct concision
That the South would not be healed,

He reaffirmed his summer decision
Not yet to quit the field.

Then the spring! Life-giving spring!
Warmth for men so wasted!

Oh, to hear the songbird sing,
And to have the coffee tasted!
Oh, to have great ladies bring
Tender meats, well basted!

But hard fell dream to fiery crash
As Grant renewed the summer clash,
To which those Rebels hasted!

Hard were spring's torrential rains
And short the Rebels' hard-bought gains
As Grant marched out before them
And steadily outwore them.

The General began a last-ditch plan
To join Joe Johnston's small command
With his own beleagured band,
Where together the greater all of them
Might make a resurgent stand.

But Grant was stronger;
His lines were longer,
And fatter and better fed.
And thus that Yankee battle-monger
Turned Rebel gray to red.

Now was spring, and days were longer,
A time for plows and mattocks;

But ere the General's troops were fed,
Came the summons to Appomattox!

Written and Copyrighted by William A. Simpson, 1987
All rights reserved

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