This Day in Henrico History: Sept. 29 – U.S. Colored Troops triumph at New Market Heights

Before dawn on Sept. 29, 1864, thousands of Union soldiers crossed the James River and advanced toward Richmond’s defenses in eastern Henrico. At New Market Heights, Black soldiers serving in the U.S. Colored Troops were assigned a central role in the attack.

Confederate defenders had strengthened their position along New Market Road with earthworks and abatis — felled trees arranged as obstacles — above the swampy ground around Four Mile Creek. The first attacks by the 4th and 6th U.S. Colored Troops became tangled in the obstacles and were met by intense infantry and artillery fire. Subsequent USCT brigades pressed the assault, and Confederate troops ultimately withdrew from the works.

The fighting was costly. The National Park Service estimates that Gen. Charles J. Paine’s division suffered about 800 casualties in little more than an hour. Fourteen Black soldiers received Medals of Honor for their valor at New Market Heights, an extraordinary concentration of the nation’s highest military honor from a single engagement. Among those remembered is Sgt. Maj. Christian Fleetwood, who helped save the colors of the 4th USCT after members of its color guard fell.

At roughly the same time, other Union troops captured nearby Fort Harrison, the strongest point in that section of Richmond’s outer defenses. Although later Union attacks failed to break through the remaining Confederate positions, New Market Heights became a landmark in both Henrico’s Civil War history and the history of Black military service in the United States.

Sources: Henrico County: https://henrico.gov/locations/new-market-heights/; National Park Service: https://www.nps.gov/rich/learn/historyculture/usct.htm; National Park Service overview: https://home.nps.gov/rich/learn/historyculture/overview.htm