The news had been expected at any moment by the Confederate leaders,
but none the less it produced intense excitement. Away went Mr. Davis,
in hot haste, also the members of his cabinet and of his congress, and
the officials of the rebel State of Virginia, and, in short, every one
who felt himself of consequence enough to make it worth his while to run
away. The night was theirs, and beneath its friendly shade they escaped,
with archives and documents which had suddenly become valuable chiefly
for historical purposes. Grant had ordered that on the morning of April
3 a bombardment should begin at five o'clock, which was to be followed
by an assault at six o'clock. But there was no occasion for either; even
at the earlier hour Petersburg was empty, and General Grant and General
Meade soon entered it undisturbed. A little later Mr. Lincoln joined
them, and they walked through streets in which neither man nor animal,
save only this little knot, was to be seen.[81]
At quarter after eight o'clock, that same morning, General Weitzel, with
a few attendants, rode into the streets of Richmond. That place,
however, was by no means deserted, but, on the contrary, it seemed
Pandemonium. The rebels had been blowing up and burning warships and
stores; they had also gathered great quantities of cotton and tobacco
into the public storehouses and had then set them on fire.
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