James D. Porter, Confederate Military History, a library of Confederate States Military History: Volume 7.1, Tennessee
Clement Anselm Evans, Ed.

[32] infantry and light battery by a retreat through Tiptonville, the only way open. His occupation of that place was anticipated by the Federal army, and on the morning of the 7th he wisely surrendered the forces under his command, consisting, as reported by him, of Stewart's field artillery company of 5 guns, and 2,900 infantry, of whom 400 were unarmed. There were 58 heavy guns abandoned, including 10 guns of the floating battery which were sunk in desperation in the Mississippi river. But General Pope reported to General Halleck ‘that 273 field and company officers, 6,700 privates, 123 pieces of heavy artillery, 35 pieces of field artillery, all of the very best character and latest patterns, 7,000 stand of small-arms, tents for 12,000 men, several wharfboats,’ and hundreds of horses and mules, with immense stores of ammunition, were surrendered to him. Col. W. G. Cumming, Fifty-first Illinois, commanding brigade, in an official report, dated the 10th of April, said: ‘Soon after the surrender I was ordered by Major-General Pope to take charge of the prisoners, who were about 3,000 in number.’ On the 8th of April, when the affair was fresh in his memory, General Pope telegraphed the department commander that ‘2,000 prisoners, including General Mackall,’ had surrendered and were prisoners of war.

Nashville had been defended at Fort Donelson. The surrender of one made it necessary to abandon the other. General Johnston determined to concentrate his own troops with those at Columbus, Ky., and at Pensacola, at Corinth, Miss., the junction of the Mobile & Ohio and the Memphis & Charleston railroads. General Grant was moving on the same point, and Gen. Don Carlos Buell, of the Federal army, who had been in front of Bowling Green with an army of 40,000 men, occupied Nashville as soon as it was abandoned by the Confederate forces, and began the movement of his troops that enabled him to form a junction with Grant in time to save the army of the latter from annihilation.