What was the most significant event on March 29 during the U.S. Civil War?

LTC Stephen F. thanks for posting this informative post on the Civil War, keep it up I learn something new every day. Its History Civil War 101. I love it.

Most of the significant action on this day took place in the western theater in Mississippi ratifying the Confederate Constitution in 1861; through the regrouping on Confederate forces under A.S. Johnson the week before Shiloh in 1862; to what would be the 10th bloodiest battle “battle” of the civil war – Vicksburg, Mississippi being launched in 1863.
However it was in 1865 with the launching of the Appomattox Campaign by LT GEN U.S. Grant that would decimate the once proud Army of Northern Virginia.
It took much longer than usual to develop todays question because I found a lot of bad information posted. I always double check and sometimes triple check before I post the question and choices.
Since RallyPoint truncates survey selection text I am posting events that were not included and then the full text of each survey choice below:
a. Saturday March 29, 1862: Eastern Theatre, Peninsula Campaign. Gen. Samuel Heintzelman, commander of the 3rd Corps of the Army of the Potomac, on Gen. McClellan’s instructions, pushes a reconnaissance in force up the James Peninsula, toward Yorktown, to ascertain the Confederate strength there. In his report, he tells McClellan that Gen. Magruder has only about 8,000 troops for sure, and calculates that Magruder cannot have any more than 18,000.
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b. Saturday March 29, 1862. Pinkerton Report,
GENERAL: I have the honor to submit the following information relative to the forces and defenses at Yorktown. Williamsburg, Bethel, &c., as extracted from various reports previously addressed to you from these headquarters: That from the statement made by James H. Maurice, deserter from the Second Florida Regiment, reported on to you on February 1, I am enabled to select the following concerning defenses on the Yorktown Peninsula, to wit: FORTS, DEFENSES, ETC., NEAR YORKTOWN, VA.
Fort Grafton is 4 miles southeast by south from Yorktown and one-quarter of a mile back of an inlet from York River: contains four 32-pounders; that in the northeast corner being rifled and protecting a powder magazine. Artillery fort, adapted for field pieces, three-quarters of a mile southeast from Fort Grafton, 42 miles southeast from Yorktown, on an old road leading from this fort to Back Creek. Breastwork for cannon on the north side of Poquosin Creek, by an old mill. Yorktown is surrounded by a breastwork, on which 32-pounders are mounted, the number of which was not known by informant. That the magazine is in Cornwallis Cave, at the foot of the bluff on which the town is built. That in immediate proximity to this magazine is a fort containing six guns, not rifled; is covered with sods for concealment, and cannot be seen until close at hand. Fort half a mile south-southwest from Yorktown, mounting three 32-pounders, one rifled; fort three-quarters of a mile south-southwest from Yorktown, mounting two 32-pounders. Rifle pit from the bridge on Back Creek northwest to the shore and along the shore westerly; that it is concealed, the earth dug from it being thrown into the water. Fort at Gloucester, opposite Yorktown, contains two 10-inch columbiads, one rifled cannon of European manufacture, and two or three 32-pounders-- in all five or six guns. Informant was sufficiently near to perceive that these guns were genuine. Informant was told, and understood from general report, that Williamsburg was well fortified, but cannot speak on that point from personal observation.
That from the statement made by William H. Ringgold, who left Gloucester November 6, 1861, reported on to you on December 2, 1861, I am enabled to present the following concerning the defenses on the Yorktown Peninsula, to wit: That at Gloucester Point proper, York River, is a battery of nine 32-pounder columbiads, pointing up, down, and across the river; that on the bluff encircling Gloucester Point is a continuous embankment about 1½ miles in length from the river above to the river below; that this embankment was used as a sentinel-walk, and that on the inside thereof was a single gun, commanding the country road coming from the north. That on Bryant's plantation, 2½ miles below Gloucester Point, are two masked batteries, commanding the river, each containing one gun, one battery being situated on each end of the plantation. That around Yorktown on the land side is a continuous embankment, about 3 miles in length, and mounted with heavy columbiads, commanding all approaches to the town; that within the embankment or breastwork are minor intrenchments. That at Yorktown there was a battery, consisting of five heavy columbiads, mounted on the heights of the town, directly opposite the Gloucester batteries, and commanding the river. That what has been called Cornwallis Cave was used as a magazine for ammunition; that the principal magazine was then (November 5) on the bluff, about 75 yards back of Cornwallis Cave, in an embankment on the upper side of the old road leading up into the town; that under the bluff just below Cornwallis Cave, concealed from upward-bound vessels behind a point on the river, is a battery of four or five short guns of large caliber, supposed to be shell guns; that this battery cannot be seen by vessels ascending the river until they have passed the point of land concealing it and are directly opposite the said battery. That there are iron gun-carriages at Ship Point, 8 miles below Toes Point; that up to November 5 there were no batteries on the York River Railroad between West Point and Richmond. That there were no fortifications or batteries on York River above Yorktown and Gloucester Point, or between the York and Rappahannock Rivers, except at Gloucester Point. That on December 9, 1861, my operative conversed with a lieutenant in General Magruder's command, said lieutenant being then on furlough at Richmond; that my operative asked the lieutenant if any further defenses had been made at West Point or on the York River within a month, and that the lieutenant replied, "No;" adding that the defenses at Gloucester Point and Yorktown were considered sufficient to protect the river. That the statement of James H. Maurice, under date of February 1, concerning the forces on the James and York River Peninsula, is substantially as follows, to wit: Encamped 3 miles southwest of Yorktown-- Second Florida, Colonel Ward, 700 to 800 men; Sixteenth Georgia, Colonel Cobb; Thirteenth Louisiana, Colonel Sulakowski. Cobb's Legion, 4½ miles south of Yorktown and 2 miles southeast from the Second Florida. Fifty-fifth Virginia, 4½ miles south-southeast of Yorktown and half a mile back from the head of the creek. Fifth Virginia Artillery, Fort Grafton, 4 miles south-southeast of Yorktown. Two regiments, names not known, on the Cornwallis battle-ground. Three regiments immediately south of Yorktown. Several regiments at Williamsburg.
That William H. Ringgold, an intelligent colored man, in report addressed to you December 2, 1861, specifies the following regiments as being on the Yorktown Peninsula and at Gloucester Point: Sixth Georgia Infantry, Colonel Colquitt, numbering 1,000 men, within the intrenchments at Yorktown above described. Louisiana Zouaves, numbering about 950, encamped a short distance below Yorktown. Second Alabama Infantry, 1,050 men, 3 miles from Yorktown, on the road to Hampton. Fifth North Carolina Infantry, 800 men, 8 miles from Yorktown, on the road to Big Bethel. Eighth Alabama Infantry, Colonel Winston, 1,000 men, near Big Bethel Church. Cobb's Legion, 5 or 6 miles from Big Bethel Church, 2½ miles west of the road to Hampton and opposite Little Bethel. This Legion consists of about 400 cavalry troops, armed with Maynard's rifles, and 600 infantry soldiers, all from Georgia, commanded by Thomas C. Cobb. Several Louisiana regiments at Williamsburg. At Gloucester Point, 5,000 infantry soldiers, 160 cavalry troops, and two companies of artillery. That the total rebel force on the York and James River Peninsula was estimated by the rebels at 25,000 men. That there is a telegraph from Richmond to West Point, also from Yorktown and Great Bethel to Richmond via James River and Grove Wharf. That there is much Union feeling among the poorer classes on the York and Rappahannock Rivers, especially among the oystermen and fishermen.
All of which is respectfully submitted by your obedient servant, E. J. ALLEN [ALLEN PINKERTON].
http://www.civilwarhome.com/pinkertonreports.html
c. Saturday March 29, 1862 --- Union soldier Oliver Willcox Norton of the 83rd Pennsylvania Infantry, writes home about their advance on the Peninsula and capture of Great Bethel: The main body of rebels had left in the morning. They have gone to Yorktown. We have orders to have three days’ cooked rations on hand, so I think we shall be after them soon. When we came back we burned all the log barracks and brush houses at the forts. All the houses here are burned and the whole country is a desert. It is one of the most beautiful sections, naturally, I have ever seen. The soil is very rich and the surface perfectly level.
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d. March 29, 1862 --- Western Theatre. Gen. Don Carlos Buell, with his Army of the Ohio, has finally set out for the link-up with Grant’s Army of the Tennessee at Pittsburg Landing. After weeks of being held up at the Duck River, the bridges having been destroyed, the water level falls rapidly. Gen. William "Bull" Nelson’s division wades across the river on this date, to push on toward the rendezvous.
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e. Saturday March 29, 1862 --- Gulf Theater: William C. Holton, of the U.S. Navy, on board the USS Hartford, Farragut’s flagship, writes in his diary of a scouting sortie by Farragut’s fleet up to Forts Jackson and St. Philip: March 29th. Nothing of importance is occurring now-a-days to mark one day from another. Yesterday, Capt. Bell, with the gunboats Kennebeck, Wissahickon and Winona, ascended the river to the forts, when Fort Jackson opened fire on them, and after firing about one hundred rounds at us our vessels hauled off. They discovered the position of the defenses, also a chain stretched across the river just below Forts Jackson and St. Philip, on eight schooners anchored between the forts. Our squadron is still gradually collecting. Capt. Porter’s mortar fleet is already here, but our large ships are not all over the bar.
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f. Saturday March 29, 1862 --- Union soldier Luman Harris Tenny writes in his journal: "March 29th. Had a good bath in the creek, and washed my clothes—new experience. Very warm and sultry."
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g. Saturday March 29, 1862 --- Lt. Charles Wright Wills, of the 7th Illinois Cavalry in southwest Missouri, writes about the possibility of a naval battle at Island No. 10, and muses for a while on what would happen if the Southern naval fleet broke through, and steamed up into Union territory: About the worst feature of the case would be the Southern officers sparking our girls as we do theirs now and the worst yet is, there is no doubt the girls would take to it kindly, for they do here, and I’m satisfied there is no difference in the feminines of the two sections, except that ours do not say "thar" and "whar." I see that it requires a good many "ifs" and "theirs" to arrange a case of this kind, but I assure you that it is not out of the range of possibilities. How’d you like to see a "Captain St. Clair de Monstachir" with C. S. A. on his buttons, making calls in Canton?
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h. Saturday March 29, 1862 --- The Richmond Daily Dispatch publishes an editorial excoriating those who are engaging in the illicit trade of cotton across enemy lines to Northern buyers: We are sorry to hear, upon what we consider a reliable source, that a brisk trade in cotton has been going on from a principal Southern seaport, as many as twenty vessels being engaged in the illicit traffic, that a large amount has found its way over Texas to Mexico; that a new device has been lately hit upon of selling it to Union men in East Tennessee, who are accumulating the article in that region to be disposed of to the Yankees, and that disloyal men in North Alabama are openly selling it to the invaders. Such conduct as this is infamous. It is meaner and falser than Yankeeism a thousand times, because Yankeeism, although engaged in invasion, and not in defence, will not, with all its love of money, sell us a single article we need, whilst we, who are defending all that men hold dear, for the sake of base greed and Inure, sell that which is the very life-blood of our country.
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i. Sunday March 29, 1863 --- David L. Day, an infantryman in the 25th Massachusetts in coastal North Carolina, writes about attending Church in the local meeting house: Church Service. March 29. Church service today for the first time in several weeks; we occupied the Methodist church. Chaplain James discoursed on neutrality. He said there could be no such thing as neutrality; a man must be one thing or the other, and those who do not declare for the government, should be treated as its enemies. The house was well filled with soldiers and the galleries running around three sides of the house were filled with darkies, who somewhat resembled an approaching thunder squall.
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j. Sunday March 29, 1863 --- Charles Wright Wills, a young officer serving in the 109th Illinois Infantry, writes in his journal about the brazen escapades of Rebel guerillas so near the Union base at LaGrange, Tennessee: Camp at Lagrange, Tenn. All perfectly quiet except the regular picket firing every night which here exceeds anything I ever before met in my experience. ‘Tis singular, too, for we have a large force of cavalry here and I should think the rascals would hardly dare to venture so near them. A few days since three guerrillas came up to one of our cavalry pickets, and while he was examining one of their passes the others watching their chance gobbled him. They at once retreated. The sergeant of the picket heard a little noise on the post and just got there in time to see the secesh disappear. He raised the alarm, and a party followed them on the run for 15 miles, rescued our man, killed three and captured four of the rascals, . . . ‘Tisn’t safe to go three miles from camp now, although 100 men can go 40 miles in any direction safely.
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k. Sunday March 29, 1863 --- A War Department clerk in Richmond, John Beauchamp Jones, writes in his diary, musing over the probability of Union victory, and the desperation of the South’s need for victory: A day of reckoning will come, for the people of the United States will resume the powers of which the war has temporarily dispossessed them, or else there will be disruptions, and civil war will submerge the earth in blood. The time has not arrived, or else the right men have not arisen, for the establishment of despotisms.
Everything depends upon the issues of the present campaign, and upon them it may be bootless to speculate. No one may foretell the fortunes of war—I mean where victory will ultimately perch in this frightful struggle. We are environed and invaded by not less than 600,000 men in arms, and we have not in the field more than 250,000 to oppose them. But we have the advantage of occupying the interior position, always affording superior facilities for concentration. Besides, our men must prevail in combat, or lose their property, country, freedom, everything,—at least this is their conviction. On the other hand, the enemy, in yielding the contest, may retire into their own country, and possess everything they enjoyed before the war began. Hence it may be confidently believed that in all the battles of this spring, when the numbers are nearly equal, the Confederates will be the victors, and even when the enemy have superior numbers, the armies of the South will fight with Roman desperation. The conflict will be appalling and sanguinary beyond example, provided the invader stand up to it. That much is certain. And if our armies are overthrown, we may be no nearer peace than before.
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l. Tuesday March 29, 1864 --- Jenkin Lloyd Jones, a Wisconsin artilleryman, still in camp at Hunstville, Alabama, writes in his journal of the unexpected but welcome arrival of provisions from Mother Bickerdyke, a volunteer nurse and herbalist whose care of the soldiers was frequently at odds with the Army Medical Corps practice. Jones is very clear how welcome the change in diet is: Huntsville, Tuesday, March 29. Rained exceedingly heavy during the night, but cleared off in the morning. Continued cool through the day. Our camp was visited to-day by Mother Bickerdyke with four mule teams loaded with good things from the North for the soldiers. Left us three barrels of potatoes, turnips, carrots, etc., one barrel of sourkraut with one of dried applies. Noble woman. I still remember with gratitude the motherly interest she took in my welfare while lying in the hospital at Corinth. Here again she comes with that which she has gathered by her own labor in the North, not leaving it to be wholly absorbed by surgeons, directors and officers, as is too often the case with sanitary goods. She comes along in a mule wagon and delivers it herself to the “good boys” as she terms us, without seeking the officers. She drew a large crowd around her soon. Her glowing, welcoming face, filled with cordiality, had a magnetic influence upon the hearts of all, such a contrast to the haughty, disdainful looks we are accustomed to receive from women in general. May God bless her noble, self-sacrificing spirit, is the soldier’s prayer.
Had a most hearty old-fashioned supper of potatoes and onions with gravy, which was better for our grease-laden systems than loads of cathartics. We had about twelve pounds of dried apples for our mess of four. . . .
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m. Tuesday March 29, 1864 --- Stephen Minot Weld, a young officer in the Union army, writes home about his regiment gathering with the rest of the re-constituted IX Corps at Annapolis, Maryland, and how unhospitable the neighborhood is for Northern soldiers: Annapolis is probably one of the worst cities in the Union at the present time. All the camp-followers attendant on our army, together with a large body of New York and Baltimore roughs, infest the place. These, together with paroled prisoners, make the place dangerous for any civilized beings. Within a fortnight four soldiers have been found between here and Annapolis with their throats cut. The last one found was a man named McAinsh of this regiment, a very good man indeed, but one who was fond of going on a “bender ” occasionally. He left camp without leave, went to Annapolis, got drunk probably, so that these rascals saw his money, and on his way out here had his throat cut, and his money taken. He was found dead in the woods close by here. . . . I hear that fifty-six infantry regiments are going with Burnside. My opinion is that we go to North Carolina, although I have no official or private information to make me say so. . . http://civilwarsesquicentdaily-wolfshield.blogspot.com/search?q=March+29%2C+1864
COL Mikel J. Burroughs LTC Stephen C. LTC (Join to see) CSM Charles Hayden SFC William Swartz Jr SGM Steve Wettstein SP6 Clifford Ward PO1 John Miller PO2 William Allen Crowder SSgt Alex Robinson SGT Randal Groover SrA Christopher Wright SGT John " Mac " McConnell SP5 Mark Kuzinski SPC Corbin Sayi SSgt (Join to see) SSgt Robert Marx

Mississippi ratification of constitution making them an official part of the confederacy, and expanding if nothing else the economic power of the confederacy has my vote.

Appomattox campaign began

Here I am, LTC Stephen F., hijacking your discussion thread again! Today is my mother's birthday. She turned 91 years old this very day. All four of her great grandfathers served in the Confederacy during the War of Northern Aggression.

Kim Bolen RN CCM ACM Here is an account of the impact of nursing in 1864.
"Tuesday March 29, 1864 --- Jenkin Lloyd Jones, a Wisconsin artilleryman, still in camp at Hunstville, Alabama, writes in his journal of the unexpected but welcome arrival of provisions from Mother Bickerdyke, a volunteer nurse and herbalist whose care of the soldiers was frequently at odds with the Army Medical Corps practice. Jones is very clear how welcome the change in diet is: Huntsville, Tuesday, March 29. Rained exceedingly heavy during the night, but cleared off in the morning. Continued cool through the day. Our camp was visited to-day by Mother Bickerdyke with four mule teams loaded with good things from the North for the soldiers. Left us three barrels of potatoes, turnips, carrots, etc., one barrel of sourkraut with one of dried applies. Noble woman. I still remember with gratitude the motherly interest she took in my welfare while lying in the hospital at Corinth. Here again she comes with that which she has gathered by her own labor in the North, not leaving it to be wholly absorbed by surgeons, directors and officers, as is too often the case with sanitary goods. She comes along in a mule wagon and delivers it herself to the “good boys” as she terms us, without seeking the officers. She drew a large crowd around her soon. Her glowing, welcoming face, filled with cordiality, had a magnetic influence upon the hearts of all, such a contrast to the haughty, disdainful looks we are accustomed to receive from women in general. May God bless her noble, self-sacrificing spirit, is the soldier’s prayer.
Had a most hearty old-fashioned supper of potatoes and onions with gravy, which was better for our grease-laden systems than loads of cathartics. We had about twelve pounds of dried apples for our mess of four. . . .
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