Qualla: Siege of Petersburg https://qualla.com/siege-of-petersburg en-us © 2026 Bendyline Mon, 20 Jul 2026 10:21:15 GMT Qualla serial false Qualla support@bendyline.com yes https://qualla.com/_m/d/q/8/g/siege-of-petersburg-wp/hero-small.webp Qualla: Siege of Petersburg https://qualla.com/siege-of-petersburg Siege of Petersburg: Introduction https://qualla.com/siege-of-petersburg/ Photo credit Public domain. The 1st Maine Heavy Artillery lost 632 of its 900 men in a single assault on June 18, 1864 -- the heaviest single-battle loss of any regiment in the entire Civil War. That carnage was just day four of what would become a nine-month ordeal around Petersburg, Virginia. Not a true siege in the classical sense, the Richmond-Petersburg campaign from June 9, 1864, to March 25, 1865, was something military history had rarely seen: industrialized trench warfare on a massive scale, with fortified lines stretching over 30 miles from eastern Richmond to southern Petersburg. It would not be seen again until the Western Front fifty years later.

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]]> Sun, 22 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/d/q/8/g/siege-of-petersburg-wp/dq8g-siege-of-petersburg-intro.mp3 0:06 1 full Siege of Petersburg: The Noose Tightens https://qualla.com/siege-of-petersburg/ Photo credit Mathew Brady Photographs of Civil War-Era Personalities and Scenes, Public domain. Ulysses S. Grant's strategy was brutally simple. Petersburg, a prosperous city of 18,000, was the junction for five railroads that fed supplies to Robert E. Lee's army and the Confederate capital at Richmond. Cut those railroads, and both the army and the capital would starve. On...

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Image: Mathew Brady Photographs of Civil War-Era Personalities and Scenes | Public domain

]]> Sun, 22 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/d/q/8/g/siege-of-petersburg-wp/dq8g-siege-of-petersburg-the-noose-tightens.mp3 0:06 2 full Siege of Petersburg: Into the Crater https://qualla.com/siege-of-petersburg/ Photo credit Mathew Benjamin Brady, Public domain. With frontal assaults failing at a staggering cost -- 11,386 Union casualties in just four days of fighting June 15-18 -- Grant's forces dug in for a prolonged campaign. The most audacious attempt to break the stalemate came from Lieutenant Colonel Henry Pleasants, a mining engin...

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Image: Mathew Benjamin Brady | Public domain

]]> Sun, 22 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/d/q/8/g/siege-of-petersburg-wp/dq8g-siege-of-petersburg-into-the-crater.mp3 0:06 3 full Siege of Petersburg: The Railroad War https://qualla.com/siege-of-petersburg/ Photo credit Mathew Benjamin Brady, Public domain. The campaign's true battlefield was the railroad network. Grant methodically targeted Petersburg's three remaining supply lines: the Richmond and Petersburg Railroad, the South Side Railroad reaching west to Lynchburg, and the Weldon Railroad running south to Wilmington, North Ca...

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]]> Sun, 22 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/d/q/8/g/siege-of-petersburg-wp/dq8g-siege-of-petersburg-the-railroad-war.mp3 0:06 4 full Siege of Petersburg: Black Soldiers at the Front https://qualla.com/siege-of-petersburg/ Photo credit Mathew Benjamin Brady, Public domain. The Siege of Petersburg featured the Civil War's largest concentration of African American troops. United States Colored Troops participated in six major engagements during the campaign and earned 15 of the 25 total Medals of Honor awarded to African American soldiers in the enti...

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]]> Sun, 22 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/d/q/8/g/siege-of-petersburg-wp/dq8g-siege-of-petersburg-black-soldiers-at-the-front.mp3 0:06 5 full Siege of Petersburg: The Last Desperate Gamble https://qualla.com/siege-of-petersburg/ Photo credit Public domain. By March 1865, Lee's army was weakened by desertion, disease, and shortage of supplies, outnumbered roughly 125,000 to 50,000. His final gamble came at Fort Stedman on March 25, when Confederate Major General John B. Gordon launched a predawn attack with nearly half of Lee's infa...

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]]> Sun, 22 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/d/q/8/g/siege-of-petersburg-wp/dq8g-siege-of-petersburg-the-last-desperate-gamble.mp3 0:06 6 full