Horace Greeley, The American Conflict: A History of the Great Rebellion in the United States of America, 1860-65: its Causes, Incidents, and Results: Intended to exhibit especially its moral and political phases with the drift and progress of American opinion respecting human slavery from 1776 to the close of the War for the Union. Volume II.

[309] 2,457. The Rebels lost quite as heavily in killed and wounded, some 2,000 prisoners, 15 or 20 guns, with thousands of small arms, &c. Among their killed was Gen. Lloyd Tilghman, of Maryland.

Next morning,¹ the pursuit being renewed, the enemy were found strongly posted on the Black, with a bold, wooded bluff directly at the water's edge on the west side, while on the east, an open, cultivated bottom, nearly a mile broad, has a bayou of stagnant water, ten to twenty feet wide and two to three feet deep, to the east of it. This had been made to serve as a wet ditch, with a line of rifle-pits behind it; and here Carr's division was stopped two or three hours, until Lawler, commanding his right brigade, discovered a way of approach whereby it could be successfully assaulted, and ordered a charge, which was gallantly made; but the volley which was fired by the enemy at close range as his command rushed across the level, open ground, down to the bayou, taking our column in flank, swept down 150 of our men. None faltered nor turned back, however, nor even stopped to fire till they were all across the bayou; when, pouring in a deadly volley, without waiting to reload, they swept on with fixed bayonets, leaving the Rebels, who had not yet found time to reload, no choice but surrender. Gen. Osterhaus, who with his division had come up on our left, was here wounded by a fragment of shell.

Beside the railroad bridge, Pemberton had constructed an army bridge over the Black, composed mainly of three steamboats; across which, all his men who could reach it fled, leaving 18 guns, 1,500 prisoners, several thousand stand of arms, and large quantities of commissary stores, to fall into the hands of the victors, whose entire loss here was but 29 killed, and 242 wounded. But the bridges were of course burned by the fugitives; and the deep river, with its forest-covered western bluff lined with sharp-shooters, baffled our advance for hours. Our only pontoon train was with Sherman, now on his way to Bridgeport, several miles farther up; and our attempts to force a passage, under cover of a fire of artillery, were baffled until after dark; when the Rebels, aware that they would be flanked if they attempted to remain here, fell back to the friendly shelter of the fortifications of Vicksburg.

Floating bridges having been constructed here and three miles above, during the night, the passage of both McClernand's and McPherson's corps commenced at 8 A. M.;² Gen. Sherman crossing simultaneously on his pontoons at Bridgeport, and pressing on to within 3 1/2 miles of Vicksburg; when, turning to the right, lie took possession, unopposed, of Walnut Hills and the banks of the Yazoo adjacent. McPherson, striking into Sherman's road, followed it to the point where the latter had obliqued to the Walnut Hills, where he halted for the night; while McClernand, advancing on the direct highway from Jackson nearly to Vicksburg, swayed to the left, so as to cover the roads leading into that city from the south-east; so that by next morning the investment of the doomed city was substantially complete; while