Battle of Sailor's Creek Battle of Sailor's Creek The Battle of Sailor's Creek was fought on April 6, 1865, near Farmville, Virginia, as part of the Appomattox Campaign, near the end of the American Civil War. It was the last major engagement between the Confederate Army of Northern Virginia, commanded by General Robert E. Lee and the Union Army under the overall direction of Union General-in-Chief Lieutenant General Ulysses S. Grant. After abandoning Petersburg, the exhausted and starving Confederates headed west, hoping to re-supply at Danville or Lynchburg, before joining General Joseph E. Johnston in North Carolina. But the stronger Union army kept pace
General officers in the Confederate States Army combat, to be the senior general officer in the CSA. That seniority strained the relationship between Joseph E. Johnston and Jefferson Davis. Johnston considered himself the senior officer in the Confederate States Army and resented the ranks that President Davis had authorized. However, his previous position in the U.S. Army was staff, not line, which was evidently a criterion for Davis regarding establishing seniority and rank in the subsequent Confederate States Army. On February 17, 1864, legislation was passed by the Congress to allow President Davis to appoint an officer to command the Trans-Mississippi Department in the Far West, with