The Beefsteak Raid occurred in September 1864 during the Siege of Petersburg as Confederate forces defending Richmond faced critical food shortages. General Robert E. Lee reported on August 22, 1864, that corn supplies for Southern soldiers were exhausted. A scout named Sergeant George D. Shadburne informed General Wade Hampton on September 5 that a substantial cattle herd of 3,000 head was lightly defended behind Union lines at Edmund Ruffin's plantation on Coggin's Point, located 5 miles down the James River from Lieutenant General Ulysses S. Grant's headquarters. This intelligence prompted Hampton to organize a cavalry raid to seize the cattle intended for Union Army consumption during the combined siege of Richmond and Petersburg, Virginia.
Confederate Major General Wade Hampton led approximately 3,000 cavalry troopers on the raid, which would ultimately cover 100 miles. Hampton believed the cattle were defended by only 120 Union soldiers and 30 civilians, though the actual defending force was larger but still numbered fewer than 500 troops. The scale of the operation—a 100-mile cavalry ride into Union-controlled territory to acquire livestock—reflected the desperation of Confederate supply conditions and the strategic importance of securing provisions for Lee's army.
The raid represented a significant Confederate effort to address the chronic supply shortages plaguing the defense of Richmond. By targeting the cattle herd specifically, Hampton aimed to strike at Union resources while simultaneously providing desperately needed provisions to the besieged Confederate forces. The operation demonstrated the continued capacity of Confederate cavalry to conduct deep raids behind Union lines even as the overall military situation deteriorated for the South during the final year of the Civil War.
The American Civil War (1861–1865) was the deadliest conflict in American history, killing an estimated 620,000 to 750,000 soldiers and an unknown number of civilians. The Confederate States of America, formed by eleven seceding Southern states, faced the Union in four years of warfare across 23 states and territories. Major engagements included First and Second Bull Run, Antietam (the bloodiest single day in American history, September 17, 1862), Chancellorsville, Gettysburg (July 1–3, 1863), Vicksburg (surrendered July 4, 1863), and Sherman's March through Georgia and the Carolinas (1864–1865). President Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation on January 1, 1863, transforming the war's stated purpose to include the abolition of slavery and enabling the enlistment of approximately 180,000 Black men in the United States Colored Troops. Confederate General Robert E. Lee surrendered to Ulysses S. Grant at Appomattox Court House on April 9, 1865. The war resolved the question of secession and ended American slavery, though Reconstruction would face sustained resistance in its attempt to secure civil rights for formerly enslaved people.
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