of the Army of the James and Major General Horatio Wright's VI Corps of the Army of the Potomac occupied Farmville while Crook's cavalry found a spot just northwest of town to ford the Appomattox River. Soon thereafter, Union Army General-in-Chief Lieutenant General Ulysses S. Grant and his staff arrived in Farmville, making the Randolph House (Prince Edward Hotel) his headquarters. When all of the Confederates crossed the river from Farmville, they formed a line of battle on Cumberland Heights overlooking the town. Artillery was set up to fire on the Union troops as they moved into Farmville. After a short period of time, the Confederates withdrew to the north to join Mahone's division around Cumberland Church. At this location, First Corps (Longstreet's) artillery chief Edward Porter Alexander told General Lee that the route of march to Appomattox Station was shorter on the south side of the river and they should have stayed there. About this time, Lee also learned that Union troops had followed the Confederates across High Bridge and he could not break away from them on the north side. Having burned the bridges at Farmville, Lee's troops could not cross back to the south side of the river there. Battle at Cumberland Church At Cumberland Church, about northwest of High Bridge and north of Farmville, Mahone's Confederates arrived first and controlled the high ground around the church. They entrenched on top of a long slope of open ground, covering the stage and plank roads to Lynchburg. Lieutenant General Anderson with little more than a few stragglers and a battalion of artillery headed west when Mahone told him that Humphreys was approaching on the same side of the river with them. Union II Corps commander Major General Humphreys, with Brigadier Generals Miles's and de Trobriand's divisions, arrived near the Lynchburg stage road at Cumberland Church about 1:00 p.m. and became engaged not just with Mahone's division, but with the entire remaining Confederate Army of Northern Virginia. As the Union force approached, Lieutenant Colonel William T. Poague's 16-gun artillery battalion opened fire on them. Soldiers from Miles's division temporarily captured the guns of Captain Arthur B. Williams's North Carolina Battery but troops of Major General Bryan Grimes's division recaptured them. Despite evident confusion and disorganization, especially among the survivors of commands hard hit at Sailor's Creek and Gordon's men who had not arrived at Farmville to get rations from