around its outskirts. Regular approaches
were never attempted, although
Sherman did bring up four 4.5-in
(114-mm) rifled guns that lobbed 30-lb
(13.6-kg) shells into the city to
supplement his field artillery.
Petersburg
At Petersburg, Grant’s officers urged
him to consider regular approaches, but
he preferred maneuver to engineering.
First, he ordered that the redoubts on
the main line be enclosed as forts to
deter Confederate attacks. He then
embarked on offensives to cut Rebel
communications and stretch their lines
to breaking point. After each gain, Grant
consolidated and then pushed out a few
miles farther, overstraining Lee’s
engineering resources. Strong forts were
interspersed along Grant’s ever-creeping
lines; even the defensive line running
along his rear was studded with forts.
became an evening ritual. “Sometimes
more than twenty shells would be in
the air at the same time, looking like
twinkling stars shooting and plunging
madly,” recalled one observer at Fort
Haskell. “Then a wide, sudden sheet of
flame would terminate its flight, and
woe to him
or them
who came
within its
deadly circle.”The Civil War would have a large impact
on the art of fortification, but there were
many lessons still to be learned about
siege warfare.A NEW ERA IN FORTIFICATION
The range, power, and accuracy of rifled
artillery had ended the era of stone and
masonry forts, often pulverizing them while
strongholds of packed earth and sand withstood
bombardment much better. Still, coastal forts
were rarely taken by naval guns alone; joint
operations between land and sea forces would
in the future become the norm.REPERCUSSIONS
European observers, impressed by the deadly
accuracy of rifled guns and their increased rates
of fire, returned home with new ideas on how
better to construct fortifications that might
withstand modern sieges. The maze of muddy
trenches, forts, and bombproofs at Petersburg
proved to be an omen of the appalling
conditions on the Western Front (1914–18).AFTER
TECHNOLOGYDetonated by a percussion cap in its nose,
the Ketchum grenade used cardboard
stabilizing fins to help direct its flight.
Thousands were used by the Union army
and navy during the Civil War, in various sizes
ranging between 1-5lb (0.5-2.2kg), often
being tossed into enemy trenches during
siege operations. They were not always
reliable, and might be thrown back at the
attacker. Another grenade was the Adams, a
small, handheld weapon that resembled aKETCHUM GRENADE
tiny cannonball. In
the heat of battle,
instead of using
a grenade,
soldiers
sometimes
simply lit the
fuses on artillery
shells and heaved or rolled
them over a defensive parapet
into an attacking infantry force.The “Dictator”
Weighing 17,000lb (7,711kg) and known as the
“Dictator,” this 13-in (330-mm) siege mortar could fire
200-lb (90-kg) shells more than two miles (3.2 km). It
was used at Petersburg for two months.
Instead of coiling ever tighter around
the city, the honeycomb of trenches,
forts, rifle pits, bombproofs, and wire
entanglements snaked outward, with
artillery emplacements everywhere.
No siege guns were more effective than
mortars, mostly 8- and 10-in (200- and
250-mm) giants, which could lob shells
behind enemy parapets.
Siege artillery made for spectacular
nocturnal fireworks. In some Union
forts at Petersburg, watching the display