First Contact

After reaching Louisa Court House on June 10, 1864, Wade Hampton’s cavalry divisions bivouacked around the Virginia Central Railroad and across Philip H. Sheridan’s route to Gordonsville. At about 3 a.m. on June 11, William C. Wickham’s Virginia cavalry brigade left camp and rode up the Marquis Road, capturing a scouting party of the 7th Michigan Cavalry about a mile north of town before continuing toward Clayton’s Store. At daybreak they met the 7th Michigan’s pickets on the opposite bank of Nunn’s Creek, attacked, and fired the first shots of the Battle of Trevilian Station. The skirmish lasted about 45 minutes in what a member of the 4th Virginia Cavalry later called “a considerable fight.” George A. Custer, camped a short distance to the north, heard the fighting and ordered the 1st Michigan to reinforce the 7th, prompting the Virginians to break off the engagement and withdraw to Louisa Court House. By 8:45 a.m., Custer’s entire Michigan Brigade and Pennington’s Battery of horse artillery were moving down Nunn’s Creek Road toward its junction with the Gordonsville Road west of Louisa Court House.

Virginia · United States