Art Bergeron
Skinner's/Watkins' Farm
Wed Jul 25 12:06:00 2001


Jim,

My take on the engagement at Skinner's Farm is that the Alabamians did not fight there but were a part of the force engaged near Watkins' Farm. I have been unable to determine the identity of Skinner, but he owned a house on the west side of Duncan Road, south of what is now Pamplin Historical Park, near the opposing picket lines. Watkins' place was farther south and east of Duncan Road. Union troops attacked the Confederate picket lines from near Petersburg to the south almost to Hatcher's Run on March 25, 1865, in response to the Confederate attack on Fort Stedman. Moody's Brigade was involved in an attempt that afternoon or evening to retake the captured picket posts.

Major General Bushrod Rust Johnson's journal indicates that Moody's Brigade left the lines east of Petersburg on March 14 and marched to the vicinity of Hatcher's Run to replace troops of Gordon's Second Corps who were being shifted from there for the assault on Fort Stedman. On March 24, Johnson wrote, "Gracie's Brigade ordered to take position in breastworks on east side of Hatcher's Run by daybreak on March 25."

The following day, he wrote: "Yankees about noon charged Moody's Brigade, carried picket line and were repulsed some three times from main line. Moody attacked enemy and failed to drive them from picket lines. Moody lost about 246 men and took ninety-three prisoners." Johnson's next entry sounds as if the brigade had its right flank on Hatcher's Run, with Henry Wise's Virginia Brigade in the trenches on the opposite (west) side.

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