City Point's Rails And Waterways

City Point's Rails And Waterways. Tools of War for General Grant. , City Point...tells more about how war is conducted than many battlefields. It demonstrates how Union forces used rivers and railroads to deliver the tools of war directly to the troops in the field. – Robert Black, The Harrisburg PA Patriot News, The significance of the City Point logistical operation in the Civil War cannot be overstated. Besides being headquarters for the United States Armies, City Point was the supply base for the Union forces fighting at Petersburg and Richmond. Immediately upon their arrival the 900-member United States Railroad Construction Corps began building the warehouses and wharves needed for supplies and war material needed for the 100,000 soldiers in the Army of the Potomac and the Army of the James., The City Point Railroad, built in 1838, was repaired and eventually extended south and west of Petersburg. City Point once again had a rail link to Petersburg, except it now linked the military supply depot with soldiers on the front lines. In just twenty-two days the army had completed the first stage of the railroad and had the trains operating on a full schedule. At Petersburg, victory rode the rails., [Captions:] , Railroad depot buildings are the focal point of this A.J. Russell photograph. The circular Sibley tents and smaller wall tents probably were occupied by Construction Corps employees., Only three days after Grant's arrival and the Union army's initial attack on the Confederate line at Petersburg, the U.S. Military Railroad Construction Corps moved into City Point. The two to three thousand Construction Corps workers were quartered throughout the area. An additional 1,600 carpenters, blacksmiths, and laborers were employed in the quartermaster repair depot. Eight large barracks stood on the north side of Pierre Street, just above the intersection of Pierce and Water Streets., Railroad cars were brought in from the north to provide rolling stock for the line. The cars, loaded to capacity, operated on a regular schedule carrying supplies to the front siege-lines around Petersburg eight miles away.