This text is part of:
[495] in advance of his entrenchments. It was at this moment that Grant ordered the fresh troops of Smith on the left and L. Wallace's division in the centre to make a general attack upon the enemy's works, before the latter could have time to look about him. While McClernand's regiments were forming again, those of Wallace bravely marched up to the assault of the height occupied by Pillow, and carried it after a bloody engagement. But they were not equally successful in capturing the entrenchments behind which they had just driven the enemy. On the left, Smith, after making several feints in the direction of the works, where Buckner had left part of his division, placed himself at the head of Lauman's brigade, which he electrified by his words and by his example. The Confederates were unable to resist that shock, and Smith, with the aid of his artillery, which took position in the entrenchments from which they had just been dislodged, easily repelled all their efforts to retake them. Night at last put an end to that sanguinary conflict, which cost each army more than two thousand men. It found the Federals masters of all the positions they had lost in the morning on the right, and firmly established on the left among the enemy's entrenchments. From these they commanded the greatest portion of the ground where the Confederate soldiers were encamped pell-mell, as well as the works of Fort Donelson. The dawn of day, which they impatiently awaited under arms, now cheerfully bearing cold and hunger, would enable them to complete their victory and gather its fruits. But, on the contrary, trouble and discouragement prevailed in the Confederate camp. After fighting a whole day to force a passage through the enemy's lines they found themselves again shut up within the same enclosure they had vainly attempted to leave; and furthermore, they beheld the enemy posted in the very centre of their line of defence. From the general-in-chief down to the last soldier all felt that the game was lost beyond hope of recovery, and no one seriously thought of prolonging the struggle. Amid the darkness, which alone afforded protection to the vanquished army, scenes were then witnessed which presented a shameful contrast to the valor and energy of which the Confederates
Philadelphia, Jos. H. Coates and co., 1876.
Tufts University provided support for entering this text.
This work is licensed under a
Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 United States License.
An XML version of this text is available for download, with the additional restriction that you offer Perseus any modifications you make. Perseus provides credit for all accepted changes, storing new additions in a versioning system.