Seven Days Battles

Overview

The Seven Days Battles were a series of seven battles over seven days from June 25 to July 1, 1862, near Richmond, Virginia, during the American Civil War. Confederate General Robert E. Lee drove the Union army's Army of the Potomac, commanded by Maj. Gen. George B. McClellan, away from Richmond and into a retreat down the Virginia Peninsula. The series of battles is sometimes known erroneously as the Seven Days campaign, but it was actually the culmination of the Peninsula campaign, not a separate campaign in its own right.

Overview adapted from Wikipedia, licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0.

Significance

The Seven Days Battles, fought June 25 to July 1, 1862, near Richmond, Virginia, marked the decisive conclusion of the Union's Peninsula campaign. Confederate General Robert E. Lee, commanding a force of approximately 112,200, drove McClellan's Army of the Potomac — numbering over 101,000 — away from the Confederate capital and forced a retreat down the Virginia Peninsula. The outcome effectively ended the Union's most direct strategic threat to Richmond in 1862. Despite suffering higher casualties than the Union forces (20,204 Confederate to 15,855 Union), Lee's offensive pressure achieved its operational objective: removing the immediate danger to Richmond and shifting the initiative in the Eastern Theater to Confederate hands. The series is properly understood as the culmination of the Peninsula campaign rather than a separate campaign, and its result foreclosed the Union's best opportunity to end the war through a rapid seizure of the Confederate capital.

Forces & casualties

Commanders (2)