Comte de Paris, History of the Civil War in America. Vol. 3.
Henry Coppee , LL.D., Ed.

Book II:—--the Mississippi.

Chapter 1:

The bayous.

Since the 17th of January, the day when Grant joined the army of McClernand on his return from Arkansas, until the capture of Vicksburg, the military and naval operations were so closely connected that we have not deemed it practicable to divide their recital. We shall continue it here as far as the memorable July 4, 1863; after which we will resume the narrative of the struggle between Lee and the Army of the Potomac, which was interrupted after the battle of Chancellorsville.

The four chapters composing this portion of the volume will comprise, first, all the efforts made by Grant in the course of three months and a half along the left and right banks of the Mississippi for the purpose of surmounting the obstacles which prevented him from approaching Vicksburg; then the operation which enabled the Union general to overcome these obstacles by crossing the Mississippi below the enemy's defences; afterward the aggressive campaign which terminated in the investment of the place; finally, the siege and the capitulation.

We shall be obliged to interrupt this recital from time to time [179] in order to speak of the operations of Banks and Farragut along the Lower Mississippi: we will show the efforts they made to assist Grant and Porter, so as to bring about that junction of the two fleets which was the crowning glory of their triumphant achievement. We shall also have to give a rapid sketch of the minor operations which marked the first six months of the year 1863 both east and west of the Mississippi. Blunt and Holmes on the one hand, Rosecrans and Bragg on the other, after the bloody encounters of Prairie Grove and Murfreesborough which have signalized the close of the year 1862, appear to be resting and calmly waiting for the result of the great conflict of which Vicksburg is the prize; consequently, in the States in which they are contending for supremacy, in Missouri and Arkansas, as well as in Kentucky and Tennessee, we have nothing to record during this period but trifling feats of arms utterly unconnected with each other.

The opportunity offered to the Federals for destroying the unfinished works, mounting but a few guns, which alone commanded the Mississippi during the summer of 1862, had passed. Sherman's campaigns at Chickasaw Bayou and those of Grant along the Yallabusha had just taught them, through hard experience, that henceforth it would be as difficult to turn Vicksburg as to approach it from the front. These obstacles only afforded them a fresh stimulus. Public opinion, which was in perfect accord with the sentiments of army men, demanded that there should be no drawing back before any sacrifice in order to accomplish the object in view. Thanks to the reinforcements he had received, Grant found himself at the end of January with one hundred and thirty thousand men under his command.¹ In order to be able to bring as many as possible before Vicksburg, he limited the occupation of the reconquered districts which he left behind him to such places as Iuka, Corinth, Memphis, and the stations located along the railroad connecting them. The village of Mound City, almost in front of Memphis, which served as a rendezvous for Southern partisans, was destroyed; General Dodge, with a division of infantry and the cavalry brigade of Colonel Cornyn, stationed himself at Corinth; Colonel Grierson [180] and his mounted men had charge of guarding the railway-line. Grant caused all the garrisons stationed above Memphis to occupy the eastern shore of the Mississippi, being well aware that the Confederates would not be able to obtain a footing in that section of country, and that small detachments could not protect it against any new raid on the part of Forrest or Morgan. Henceforth, all his supplies followed the course of the river, the guarding of which was exclusively entrusted to the gunboats. General Washburne, who occupied Helena, and had led a successful expedition in the direction of Lagrange on the 3d of January in order to free its approaches, was charged with the defence of this important point, which occupied a portion of the territory of the State of Arkansas, and he kept an advance post at Clarendon on the White River.

McPherson, who still occupied Holly Springs, and whose cavalry kept watch over the banks of the Tallahatchie, started again by the Memphis road on the 21st, and everything was ready for transporting a considerable portion of the army by water as far as Vicksburg. Grant reserved for himself the right of directing this great expedition in person. By this arrangement McClernand was reduced to the command of his single army corps, as Sherman, under him, had been a few weeks previously. He remonstrated, stating that the President had granted him the exclusive right of leading any expedition along the Mississippi; but in vain. More fortunate than McClellan, Grant was sustained by the government at Washington; his relations with his subordinate, however, were always of a very delicate nature. The two other corps, the Sixteenth and the Seventeenth, which constituted the bulk of his army, were, as we have above stated, commanded by Hurlbut and McPherson.

The hills extending from Haines' Bluff to Vicksburg stretch out beyond the city, following close the course of the Mississippi as far as Warrenton; then, standing apart in order to leave a passage for the Big Black River, and returning to hug the shore a short distance beyond this point, terminate at last in an acclivity upon which stands the village of Grand Gulf. The Yazoo first, then the Mississippi (which waters the base of these hills), form a natural moat which no army could cross without the aid of a numerous [181] and powerful fleet. This moat is not separated from the heights except in the lower part of the Yazoo: the Federals, having control of the pass at this point, had learned to their cost that the obstacle of Chickasaw Bayou and the neighboring swamps rendered this control useless to them. It was impossible to make an attack from the front, between Haines' Bluff and Warrenton, upon this range of cliffs bristling with redoubts and cannon: it was therefore necessary to turn it at either extremity; but this operation, which was to be initiated by the crossing of the Yazoo above Haines' Bluff, or the Mississippi below Vicksburg, could only be accomplished by the aid of naval vessels, and the latter were not in a condition to penetrate into those parts of these two rivers where their co-operation would have been necessary. On one side rafts of timber and torpedoes obstructed the navigation of the Yazoo in the vicinity of Haines' Bluff even more effectively than at the end of December, and on the other Pemberton was completing the armament of the earthworks, which threatened any vessel attempting to force the passage of Vicksburg with almost certain destruction. Instead of erecting batteries at the water's edge, which would have been exposed to the converging fire of the men-of-war, he had placed his guns on the summit of the cliff, so as to give them a plunging fire and protect them from the naval guns, which could not attain sufficient elevation to reach them. In short, he had spaced and isolated them in such a manner that they scarcely presented a mark in case of bombardment. It is true that this arrangement had been strongly condemned by