No assistance could be sent to them, for the arrival of fresh troops would but have added to the confusion.

All day the conflict went on, the Federals lining the edge of the crater, and exchanging a heavy musketry fire with the Confederate infantry, while the mass below suffered terribly from the artillery fire.

When night closed, the survivors of the great column that had marched forward in the morning, confident that victory was assured to them, and that the explosion would lay Petersburg open to capture, made their retreat, the Confederates, however, taking a considerable number of prisoners.

The Federal loss in killed, wounded, and captured was admitted by them to be 4000; the Confederate accounts put it down at 6000.
After this terrible repulse it was a long time before Grant again renewed active operations, but during the months that ensued his troops suffered very heavily from the effects of fever, heightened by the discouragement they felt at their want of success, and at the tremendous losses they had suffered since they entered Virginia on their forward march to Richmond..