The 1914 steel railroad bridge spans the Appomattox River above the brick piers of the antebellum High Bridge, which carried the South Side Railroad. The old wooden bridge and the wagon bridge just to its east were the scene of two desperate engagements in April 1865. On April 6, Confederate cavalry prevented a mixed detachment of Union infantry and cavalry from capturing and burning the bridges to block the Confederate retreat. The next day, withdrawing Confederates attempted to destroy the structures to prevent pursuing Federals on the south side of the Appomattox from crossing or using them. They burned several spans of the railroad superstructure, and one collapsed into the river, but they failed to destroy the wagon bridge when Union soldiers swarmed over it despite Confederate small-arms fire and extinguished the flames with canteens and wet tent canvas. The Confederates, Gen. John B. Gordon's corps and Gen. William Mahone's division, continued retreating west. Gordon followed the South Side Railroad to Farmville, while Mahone took Jamestown Road to Cumberland Church, three miles north of town, where the division entrenched and was soon approached by Gen. Andrew A. Humphreys' Union corps after it had crossed the wagon bridge.
