Benson J. Lossing, Pictorial Field Book of the Civil War. Volume 2.

[211] the afternoon they came in sight of the fort, drove in the pickets, and proceeded, with some severe skirmishing, to take their prescribed positions, as nearly as possible. Every thing was in readiness for battle before morning, and at dawn

Feb. 13, 1862.

the attack was commenced by the sharp-shooters of Colonel Berge (Sixty-sixth Illinois Regiment¹), who advanced upon the Confederate pickets, and thus disclosed the position of the Nationals. The batteries of the Confederates, on the land side, were at once opened, while the water batteries engaged the Carondelet, a solitary ironclad gun-boat in the river. During a desultory fire from the Confederates, Grant rapidly posted his troops for the most vigorous work. McClernand was placed on the right, with Oglesby's Brigade at the extreme, and Smith's was posted on the left, opposite the northwest portion of the fort. The light artillery was planted, with proper infantry supports, upon the various roads, to repel approaching columns, while the heavier guns, under the direction of Major Cavender, were brought to bear upon those of the fort.

With this general disposition of his troops along a line nearly four miles in length, Grant, who had made the house of Mrs. Crisp, about two miles from Dover, at the head of Hickman's Creek, his Headquarters, refrained from a general attack, while waiting for the arrival of the gun-boats and Wallace's Third Division. Yet heavy artillery firing and brisk skirmishing were kept up all the forenoon, and Berge's sharpshooters, concealed behind logs and trees,

Grant's Headquarters, Fort Donelson.

spread terror among the Confederate gunners, who were rapidly picked off by them. Finally, with a determination to make a lodgment upon the Confederate entrenchments, McClernand, at about noon, ordered Colonel Wallace to capture a formidable battery, known as the Middle Redoubt, on a hill west of a valley, which separated the right wing under Buckner from the right center commanded by Colonel Hieman. The troops employed for this purpose were Illinois regiments — the Seventeenth, Major Smith, commanding; the Forty-eighth, Colonel Hayne; and the Forty-ninth, Colonel Morrison--covered by McAllister's battery. They were placed under Hayne, who was the senior colonel. Dashing across the intervening knolls and ravines, and up toward the battery, with great spirit, they found themselves confronted by superior numbers. Their line not being long enough to envelope the works, the Forty-fifth Illinois, Colonel Smith, were