Parke’s troops quickly lost the element of surprise when the accidental discharge of a musket prematurely alerted a Confederate outpost. Soon afterward, the Rebel skirmish line was encountered and driven back into the fieldworks shielding the Boydton Plank Road. Although Meade had expected the IX Corps to move and attack vigorously, Parke now ordered ‘a careful reconnaissance to be made of the line of the enemy’s works, with a view of finding some weak point where I could attack with reasonable prospect of success.’ No weak point was found, and Parke satisfied himself with extending his line to make connections on both flanks before entrenching.

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Warren also found progress difficult. He had not wanted to move before daybreak in the first place, but a sharp telegram from Meade ordered him to start out at 4 a.m. In the darkness and with rain beginning to fall, parts of the command soon got mixed up and lost cohesion. Not until it was light enough to see did the V Corps’ column finally begin to move into the woods beyond its entrenchments. Obstructions placed across the road by the Confederates further delayed the advance. Trying to keep to the prescribed route, Warren laboriously cut a new road through a half-mile stretch of timber. Brigadier General Charles Griffin deployed skirmishers and advanced one brigade of his division into the woods east of Hatcher’s Run until they ran into a strongly held line of Confederate entrenchments.

When Grant and Meade arrived on the scene at about 9 a.m., they saw that neither Parke nor Warren would be able to push through the Confederate entrenchments with a direct thrust as they had expected. Meade now ordered Warren to execute the backup plan, sending part of his command westward across Hatcher’s Run to link up with Hancock. At the same time, Warren directed Brig. Gen. Samuel W. Crawford to take his V Corps division across the run at Armstrong’s Mill and follow its bank upstream until he could recross and take the Confederate line from the flank.

Although Hancock was also delayed by road obstructions, his lead unit, Egan’s 2nd Division, was able to press quickly enough along the Vaughan Road to reach the ford across Hatcher’s Run shortly after daylight. A small Confederate fieldwork on the far side of the run guarded the crossing, its approaches made difficult by trees felled in the waist-deep water. Union skirmishers tried to rush the Confederate position, but were halted by fire from a detachment of dismounted Georgia cavalry. Egan hastily deployed Brig. Gen. Thomas A. Smyth’s 3rd Brigade into a battle line and sent it splashing across Hatcher’s Run, capturing the Confederate rifle pits and taking several prisoners. To the amusement of the men of the 12th New Jersey, who were wading through the cold water, their color-bearer was able to dash across the stream dry-shod by running along one of the fallen trees. Standing atop the Rebel earthworks, the color sergeant waved his flag, shouting for the rest of the regiment to hurry up. Egan brought over the rest of his division and pushed farther south along the Vaughan Road.

Gregg’s cavalry division, charged with the protection of Hancock’s left flank, crossed farther downstream. After driving off a small defensive force of South Carolina cavalry, Gregg pushed westward to the Quaker Road, which he expected to follow north to the Boydton Plank Road and a planned junction with Hancock’s infantry. En route, however, Gregg captured enemy couriers and learned that he was in a perilous situation. To his front was Maj. Gen. Matthew C. Butler’s crack cavalry division, and on his left was the cavalry division of Maj. Gen. Fitzhugh Lee, nephew of Robert E. Lee. Major General Wade Hampton, commander of the Army of Northern Virginia’s cavalry corps, was determined to halt Gregg along the Quaker Road at the bridge over Gravelly Run and then trap the Union cavalry column between Butler’s and Lee’s divisions.

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