| Battle of Saint Mary's Church (Samaria Church) | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Part of the American Civil War | |||||||
| |||||||
| Belligerents | |||||||
 United States (Union) |
 CSA (Confederacy) | ||||||
| Commanders and leaders | |||||||
| David McM. Gregg | Wade Hampton | ||||||
| Strength | |||||||
| 2,147 [2] | 4,000[2] | ||||||
| Casualties and losses | |||||||
| 350[3] | 250[3] | ||||||
The Battle of Saint Mary's Church (also called Samaria Church in the South, or Nance's Shop) was an American Civil War cavalry battle fought on June 24, 1864, as part of Union Lt. Gen. Ulysses S. Grant's Overland Campaign against Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee's Army of Northern Virginia.[4]
As Maj. Gen. Philip Sheridan's Union cavalry of the Army of the Potomac returned from their unsuccessful raid against the Virginia Central Railroad and the Battle of Trevilian Station, they gathered up supply wagons from the recently abandoned supply depot at White House and proceeded toward the James River. On June 24, the Confederate cavalry under Maj. Gen. Wade Hampton attacked the column of Brig. Gen. David McM. Gregg's division at St. Mary's Church. The Confederates outnumbered the Union cavalrymen five brigades to two and were able to drive them from their breastworks, but Gregg's men successfully screened the wagon train, which continued to move unmolested to the James.
- ^ National Park Service battle description
- ^ a b Wittenberg, p. 301, states that Gregg's division had 2,147 men engaged and that the Confederates "outnumbered Gregg by nearly two to one." Salmon, p. 409, provides the brigade numbers.
- ^ a b Kennedy, p. 295. Wittenberg, pp. 284-85, cites 357 Union casualties, "close to 200" Confederate. Salmon, p. 410, cites 339 Union casualties, Confederates "fewer than 300." Longacre, p. 306, states "fewer than 300 Confederates had become casualties, more than 350 for Gregg."
- ^ The campaign classification and Kennedy, p. 295, place this battle within the Overland Campaign. Salmon, pp. 408-10, considers it to be part of the "Richmond & Petersburg Campaign", which is sometimes known as the Siege of Petersburg. Salmon states that Samaria Church was "misnamed in Federal accounts as St. Mary's Church."