At Bentonville, General William T. Sherman's Union army, advancing from Fayetteville toward Goldsboro, met and battled the Confederate army of General Joseph E. Johnston. General Robert E. Lee had directed the Confederates to make a stand in North Carolina to prevent Sherman from joining General U.S. Grant in front of Lee's army at Petersburg, Virginia. Johnston had raised nearly 30,000 men from South Carolina, Alabama, Mississippi, Tennessee, and eastern North Carolina, including two full generals besides Johnston, four lieutenant generals, fourteen major generals, and many brigadier generals. Sherman's army of 60,000 men was divided into two wings, with 30,000 men in the Left Wing marching via Averasboro and Bentonville and 30,000 men in the Right Wing marching on a parallel route to the southeast. Sherman's objective in North Carolina was Goldsboro, where 40,000 additional troops and fresh supplies would reinforce his weary army. The three-day battle ended in stalemate. After an initial success on the first day, the Confederates were unable to destroy the united Federal Left and Right Wings, and on the night of March 21-22 they withdrew. The Union army, anxious to reach Goldsboro, did not pursue. Confederate casualties were 239 killed, 1,694 wounded, and 673 missing; Union casualties were 304 killed, 1,112 wounded, and 221 missing, for a total of 4,243 killed, wounded, and missing. The battle was important because it was the only major Confederate attempt to stop Sherman after the Battle of Atlanta, the last major Confederate offensive in which the Confederates chose the ground and made the initial attack, and the largest battle ever fought on North Carolina soil. The Harper House, where John and Amy Harper raised their eight children, was used during the battle as a Union hospital and afterward as a Confederate hospital, and 360 soldiers are buried in the nearby Confederate Cemetery.