ROANOKE TIMES 
                      Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times

DATE: Saturday, June 22, 1996                TAG: 9606240061
SECTION: VIRGINIA                 PAGE: C-3  EDITION: METRO 
DATELINE: LOCUST GROVE  
SOURCE: Associated Press 

STATE OPENS SECOND CIVIL WAR TRAIL

It was the campaign that eventually ended the Civil War, and it was the costliest of the conflict.

Virginia has put together a 100-mile self-guided driving tour that follows the bloody path of Union Gen. Ulysses S. Grant in his 1864 march toward Petersburg and the eventual surrender of Robert E. Lee at Appomattox.

``We're here to relive, in a sense, the heavyweight bout of Lee and Grant,'' John Reynolds, deputy director of the National Park Service, told a crowd at Germanna Community College on Thursday for the opening of the trail. ``It determined the course of our great nation.''

The new trail, the second devoted to the Civil War, allows war buffs and sightseers to follow the footsteps of Grant and Lee on back roads in rural central Virginia and see more than 50 sites within about two days.

Called ``Lee vs. Grant: The 1864 Campaign,'' it represents the second phase of the four-stage, statewide Civil War Trails project. The first phase was Lee's Retreat, a tour of 20 sites between Petersburg and Appomattox.

The trail, a state and local partnership, was mostly financed with federal funds.

``We hope that this is a fine example to the rest of the nation and can lead us to link the natural and cultural resources and sites in our country from east to west and north to south,'' Reynolds said.

The tour begins at Germanna Ford in Orange County and snakes south through well-known battle sites at the Wilderness, Spotsylvania, the North Anna River and Cold Harbor before ending at Petersburg.

At the Wilderness, Lee's army slammed into Grant's advancing forces.

At Spotsylvania, the outmanned Southerners threw up a human roadblock.

At the North Anna River, Lee turned back Union attacks.

At Cold Harbor, the battered Confederates dug in and won Lee's last major victory. More than 12,000 Union troops died in the space of one hour in a futile attempt to storm the Confederate lines across open fields.

In one month of fighting, Grant lost nearly 55,000 men but continued to press Lee back into Petersburg for a long and costly siege.

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