midnight precisely
An hour afterward , I had rejoined Stuart . Such were the singular scenes which I witnessed , amid the shadows of the Spottsylvania Wilderness , in the first days of May , 1864 . The narrative has brought the reader now to an hour past midnight on the third of May . An hour before -- that is to say , at midnight precisely -- the Federal forces began to move : at six in the morning , they had massed on the north bank of the Rapidan ; and as the sun rose above the Wilderness , the blue columns began to cross the river . General Grant , at the head of his army of 140,000 men , had set forth on his great advance toward Richmond -- that advance so often tried , so often defeated , but which now seemed , from the very nature of things , to be destined to succeed . Any other hypothesis seemed absurd . What could 50,000 do against nearly thrice their number ?