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unconditionally, laid down their arms, and received each his parole.
At almost the same hour,
Commodore Foote received a flag of truce from
Island Number10, with an offer to surrender the island to him. Up to that time, the
Confederates on the island had been ignorant of the disaster that
Walke and
Pope had inflicted upon their friends below, and those who had fled in that direction expected to find shelter behind the batteries near
Tiptonville.
There had been grave doubts in the minds of the commanders on the island concerning their ability to hold it, ever since the
Carondelet ran the blockade,
and
Beauregard's quick perceptions were satisfied that the siege must soon end in disaster and perhaps disgrace.
So, on the morning after the passage of that vessel,
he turned over the command on the island to
General McCall, leaving
McCown in charge of the troops on the
Tennessee and
Kentucky shores, and, with a considerable body of the best troops, departed for
Corinth, in
Upper Mississippi, there to prepare to check a formidable movement of the Nationals toward
Alabama and
Mississippi, by way of
Middle Tennessee and the
Tennessee River, which we shall consider presently.
On assuming command,
McCall issued a flaming order announcing it,
1 and within thirty-six hours afterward he, too, satisfied of imminent danger, ordered his infantry and
Stewart's battery to the
Tennessee shore, in a position favorable to escape, leaving only the artillerists on the island.
The latter was the force that offered to surrender to
Foote, and the entire number of his prisoners was only seventeen officers, three hundred and sixty-eight private soldiers, four hundred sick, and one hundred men employed on the Confederate vessels.
The number of prisoners taken by
Pope and
Foote together
was seven thousand two hundred and seventy-three, including three generals and two hundred and seventy-three field and company officers.
The spoils of victory were nearly twenty batteries, with one hundred and twenty-three cannon and mortars,
2 the former varying from 32 to 100-pounders; seven thousand small arms; an immense amount of ammunition on the island and in magazines at points
