The Battle of Mine Run, also known as Payne's Farm, or New Hope Church, or the Mine Run campaign (November 27 – December 2, 1863), was conducted in Orange County, Virginia, in the American Civil War.
An unsuccessful attempt of the Union Army of the Potomac to defeat the Confederate Army of Northern Virginia, it was marked by false starts and low casualties and ended hostilities in the Eastern Theater for the year.
After the Battle of Gettysburg in July, Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee and his command retreated back across the Potomac River into Virginia. Union commander Maj. Gen. George G. Meade was widely criticized for failing to pursue aggressively and defeat Lee's army. Meade planned new offensives in Virginia for the fall. His first attempt was a series of inconclusive duels and maneuvers in October and November known as the Bristoe campaign.
In late November, Meade attempted to steal a march through the Wilderness of Spotsylvania and strike the right flank of the Confederate Army south of the Rapidan River. Meade had intelligence reports that Lee's army, half the size of Meade's Army of the Potomac (actually 48,000 to Meade's 81,000), was split in two, separated by Clark's Mountain, with the two flanks anchored at Mine Run and Liberty Mills, over thirty miles apart. His plan was to cross the Rapidan at points beyond Maj. Gen. J.E.B. Stuart's cavalry screen, overwhelm the right flank (Lt. Gen. Richard S. Ewell's Second Corps) and then follow up with the remainder (Lt. Gen. A.P. Hill's Third Corps).
Unlike Maj. Gen. Joseph Hooker's plan in the Chancellorsville campaign earlier that year on essentially the same ground, Meade planned no diversions; he intended a lightning strike with his entire army. The army marched on November 25 and got off to a good start, aided by fog on Clark's Mountain, which screened his movements from Confederate lookouts. However, Maj. Gen. William H. French's III Corps got mired in fording the river at Jacob's Ford, causing traffic jams when they moved their artillery to Germanna Ford, where other units were attempting to cross.
Speed had escaped Meade, who was furious with French, and this allowed Lee time to react. Lee ordered Maj. Gen. Jubal A. Early, in temporary command of Ewell's Second Corps, to march east on the Orange Turnpike to Locust Grove, where Early's men began skirmishing with advance Union elements. Maj. Gen. Edward "Allegheny" Johnson's division was marching along the Raccoon Ford Road to join Early when the head of Gen. French's III Corps made contact in the heavy wooded terrain along the Widow Morris Road. Johnson turned his division about and ordered what can only be described as a reckless double-envelopment assault against a mostly unseen enemy of unknown strength, throwing his 5,500 men against French and John Sedgwick's VI Corps (a combined 32,000). It was about 3:45 - 4:00 p.m. Johnson's assault fell apart quickly on the left, where Steuart lost control of his brigade, and quickly bogged down in the middle (Stonewall Brigade) and on the right (Stafford and Jones), but was strong enough to slow down the Union advance until nightfall, when Johnson left the field on his own accord, retreating with the rest of the army west behind the Mine Run Creek. The actual fighting consumed less than two and one-half hours and the losses were heavy. Johnson lost nearly 550 men (or 10% of his strength) and French's corps about 950 from all causes. The Battle of Payne's Farm was short, bloody, and important. Johnson's attack put French and his III Corps back on its heels, slowed the advance, and saved Lee's army. If Johnson had cleared the Widow Morris Road before the arrival of French and Sedgwick, or had been driven away in defeat, the 32,000 Federals could have marched behind Lee's left flank and into his rear.
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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