For forty crucial days they fought a bloody struggle. When it was over, the Civil War’s tide had turned. In the spring of 1864, Virginia remained unbroken, its armies having repelled Northern armies for more than two years. Robert E. Lee’s Army of Northern Virginia had defeated the campaigns of four Union generals, and Lee’s veterans were confident they could crush the Union offensive this spring, too.But their adversary in 1864 was a different kind of Union commander–Ulysses S. Grant.
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