stood that on Monday we had not more than twelve or fifteen thousand men on the field to contend with the fresh and overwhelming reinforcements of Buell, and our obstinate restatance on that occasion has given the encouragement, that with the additional forces now at command, and the splendid reorganization which has taken place, we shall be in truth invinclole.
Again, it is to be borne in mind that in the fight of Sunday we took the steel out of forty thousand men. They who punished us at Donelson found their match at Shilch, and fied like routed sheep to the cover of their gunboats, so thorouguly whipped that they never will fight as well again.
Again, there is not an individual in the army of the Mississppi who does not daily realize the superiority of our position, the extent of our preparations, and the apparent impregnability of our fortifications.
Confidence in our Generals is supreme, and a spirit of emulation has been born among the various regiments that will result in
nexperience on the part of the gunners.--It is said — and I have no doubt of it — that many guns were dismounted by the recoil, owing to the eccentrics having been carelessly left in gear when the pieces were fired.
while others were spoiled and rendered useless by the priming wires being left in the vent, while the charge was rammed.
Our firing was a so bad. Yet at both those places the loss of the garrison was trifling, when compared to the weight and length of the enemy's fire.
At Donelson, by Commodore Foote's own showing, the gunboats were fairly whipped and withdrawn.
Gunboats had nothing to do with the taking of Fort Pulaski.
At Island No.10, they failed.
Forts Jackson and St. Philips surrendered from treachery and mutiny, and that alone.
Fort Macon was taken by land batteries.
Let our men stand to their guns and fight them as the officers and men of our Navy did the other day at Drewry's Stuff, and there are few rivers in this country in which the Yankee gunboat
Pratts Zouaves opened brisk fire on the battery at a distance of 36 yards; but old Richmond was in the field, and soon shelled them from the position and drove them back to Princeton.
A momentary suspense ensued, when, to our surprise, we heard heavy firing in our rear, which the infantry quite as hotly returned.
We soon learned that the enemy, who had escaped Heth, had been following us up all day, and were attacking us with a much superior force; but, all praise to the gallant heroes of Donelson, under Wharton and Hennshall, they were driven in a perfect run from the field.
During this engagement the men were exposed to the hottest fire, and I will say that I never saw men, both of the infantry and artillery, bear themselves more gallantly.
Col. Wharton, Major Hennshall, and Capt. Peter Otey commanded the infantry, while Lieut. Edward Norvell and O. Serg't John B. Langhorne commanded the rifled gun, which did such execution.
Where all bore themselves so well, it would be doing i
f which are known.
It is known that Pemberton had the advantage of the ground — that he was successful until Grant reached the field with reinforcements from Jackson.
Pemberton did not fight half his forces.
General Lloyd Tilghman's division was known to have been engaged.
He was killed.
Trighman commanded at Fort Henry, and had the alternative of escaping and losing his army, or saving his army and being captured himself.
He chose the latter alternative.
A few days after Buckner, at Donelson, had the alternative of escaping and losing his army, or of sharing its fate in captivity.
He shared its fate.
Both were heroes and noble examples of Kentucky chivalry.
Loring, who commenced our left wing, did not engage until late, when he found himself surrounded by the enemy in heavy force.
He charged and cut his way through their lines, and marched on Crystal Springs, twenty eight miles south of Jackson.
After getting out, it is said, he encountered a supply train of Grant's, of o
war to all the nations of the earth, whilst we, with none of these advantages, have been shut out from all nations.
Surely, with such odds in their favor, whatever else their success in this war might prove, it would never vindicate that which they are most eager to establish--Yankee pluck and prowess.
What have these people to brag of?
They never gained a victory which was not gained by the most enormous superiority in numbers and appliances of war. Their boasted General, Grant, at Donelson and Vicksburg, what did he do, but, after the most laborious and protracted efforts, with the gunboats and resources of the whole United States, added to a land force of three to one, overcome a feeble and poorly equipped band of heroes, who at last surrendered not to him but to starvation?
Is it such achievements as these that make the Wellington or Napoleons of the world?
What nation has ever yet established a name for heroism; what old warrior ever frowned in the brass or marble of Gre
t powers of physical endurance.
The career of the Army of Tennessee, from the retreat from Bowling Green and fall of Fort Donelson, down to the disaster at Missionary Ridge — whether under Sidney Johnston, Beauregard, or Bragg — has been one of constant retreats and few victories.
The troops, with hardly an exception, have always fought well, and have always fought against superior numbers, and always against the best officers in the Federal army; and if they had been as successful at Donelson or Shiloh as the Army of the Potomac was at Manassas, the probability is, they would now be holding Grant at bay in Kentucky, as Lee is holding Meade at bay in Northern Virginia.
But there are other causes for their want of success besides the inequality of numbers.
The Army of Tennessee has always operated in a region where the physical features of the country were against it, as witness the Mississippi, the Ohio, the Cumberland, and the Tennessee, large navigable streams by which the en
he uncompromising, because, supposed to be safe, people may persuade even these "last-ditch" men that there is no hope for them, that extermination is only a question of time, and not of possibility.
Those who have fled from the avenging hosts of freedom, from far off Kentucky and Tennessee, and who have settled themselves down to quiet on the shores of the Atlantic, will find that even there the starry banner is to come, borne aloft by the same hands who planted it on the ramparts of Donelson, or high above the clouds on Lookout, or within the massive earthworks about Atlanta.
Savannah is not as capable of defence as most other cities of the South.
It is situated on a broad, level plane, and its defences at present are very imperfect.
The city is on the Savannah river, eighteen miles from Fort Pulaski, which was built to guard the entrance to the river.
This fort has long since been in our possession.
The river, above the fort and below the city, has been thoroughly
multitude of routed, beaten, discomfited men, whose valor has almost atoned for the sins of rebellion!" "Our gallant grey brothers are even now clamoring around Washington," &c. "So with the Generals of the Rebellion.
The greatest of them all is now a teacher of mathematics in a university.
Sherman's great antagonists are in the express and railroad business.
The once-dreaded Beauregard will sell you a ticket from New Orleans to Jackson; and, if you want to send a couple of hams to a friend in Richmond, Joe Johnston, once commander of great armies, will carry them.
The man whose works Grant moved upon at Donelson edits an indifferent newspaper in New Orleans, while the Commander of the Rebel cavalry at Corinth is his local reporter.
Marshall practices law in New Orleans; Forrest is running a saw-mill; Dick Taylor is now having a good time in New York; Roger A. Pryor is a daily practitioner at our courts; and so with the rest of this bold, vindictive and ambitious race of men."
