This second part of Volume XI of the ORs continues the reports of the Peninsular Campaign in Virginia, the first Union offensive of the Civil War, from June 25 to September 2, 1862. The record begins with the "Seven Days Battles," during which Robert E. Lee and the Army of Northern Virginia denied General George McClellan's Union troops the capture of Richmond. Colloquially known as "The Official Records of the War of the Rebellion," or often simply the Official Records or ORs, the full 129-volume series is an unparalleled work of collaborative national history and a primary resource for all Civil War histories. The U.S. government began collecting its own documents—military orders, reports, correspondence, and maps—before the war's end, and the Government Printing Office began publishing the series in the 1880s. This edition was originally issued by the National Historical Society press in 1971 and reprinted in 1985.