IN CAMP AND BATTLE WITH GRANT AND HIS GENERALS.
Marching into the enemy's country—A night in a church with a Bible for pillow—Our communications are cut—Entering the capital of Mississippi—The War Department gives Grant full authority—Battle of Champion's Hill—General Logan's peculiarity—Battlefield incidents—Vicksburg invested and the siege begun—Personal traits of Sherman, McPherson, and McClernand.
It was the second day of May, 1863, when I rode into Port Gibson, Miss., and inquired for Grant's headquarters. I found the general in a little house of the village, busily directing the advance of the army. He told me that in the battle of the day before the Confederates had been driven back on the roads to Grand Gulf and Vicksburg, and that our forces were now in full pursuit. By the next morning, May 3d, our troops had possession of the roads as far as the Big Black. As soon as he was sure of this, General Grant started with a brigade of infantry and some twenty cavalrymen for Grand Gulf. I accompanied him on the trip. When within about seven miles of Grand Gulf we found that the town had been deserted, and leaving the brigade we entered with the cavalry escort.
During this ride to Grand Gulf Grant made inquiries on every side about the food supplies of the country we were entering. He told me he had been gathering information on this point ever since the army crossed the Mississippi, and had made up his mind that both beef and cattle and corn were abundant in the country. The result of this inquiry was that here at Grand Gulf Grant took the resolve which makes the Vicksburg campaign so famous—that of abandoning entirely his base of supplies as soon as the army was all up and the rations on the way arrived, boldly striking into the interior, and depending on the country for meat and even for bread.
We did not reach Grand Gulf until late on May 3d, but at one o'clock on the morning of the 4th Grant was off for the front. He had decided that it was useless to bring up the army to this place, to the capture of which we had been so long looking, and which had been abandoned so quickly now that our army was across the Mississippi. I did not follow until later in the day, and so had an opportunity of seeing General Sherman. His corps was marching from above as rapidly as possible down to Hard Times landing, and he had come over to Grand Gulf to see about debarking his troops there; this he succeeded in doing a couple of days later.
That evening I joined Grant at his new headquarters at Hankinson's Ferry on the Big Black, and now began my first experience with army marching into an enemy's territory. A glimpse of my life at this time is given in a letter to a child, written the morning after I rejoined Grant:
"All of a sudden it is very cold here. Two days ago it was hot like summer, but now I sit in my tent in my overcoat, writing, and thinking if I only were at home instead of being almost two thousand miles away.
"Away yonder, in the edge of the woods, I hear the drum-beat that calls the soldiers to their supper. It is only a little after five o'clock, but they begin the day very early and end it early. Pretty soon after dark they are all asleep, lying in their blankets under the trees, for in a quick march they leave their tents behind. Their guns are all ready at their sides, so that if they are suddenly called at night they can start in a moment. It is strange in the morning before daylight to hear the bugle and drums sound the reveille, which calls the army to wake up. It will begin perhaps at a distance and then run along the whole line, bugle after bugle and drum after drum taking it up, and then it goes from front to rear, farther and farther away, the sweet sounds throbbing and rolling while you lie on the grass with your saddle for a pillow, half awake, or opening your eyes to see that the stars are all bright in the sky, or that there is only a faint flush in the east, where the day is soon to break.
"Living in camp is queer business. I get my meals in General Grant's mess, and pay my share of the expenses. The table is a chest with a double cover, which unfolds on the right and the left; the dishes, knives and forks, and caster are inside. Sometimes we get good things, but generally we don't. The cook is an old negro, black and grimy. The cooking is not as clean as it might be, but in war you can't be particular about such things.
"The plums and peaches here are pretty nearly ripe. The strawberries have been ripe these few days, but the soldiers eat them up before we get a sight of them. The figs are as big as the end of your thumb, and the green pears are big enough to eat. But you don't know what beautiful flower gardens there are here. I never saw such roses; and the other day I found a lily as big as a tiger lily, only it was a magnificent red."
Grant's policy now was to push the Confederates ahead of him up the Big Black River, threatening Jackson, the State capital, and the Big Black bridge behind Vicksburg, and capturing both if necessary. His opinion was that this maneuver would draw Pemberton out of Vicksburg and bring on a decisive battle within ten days.
From Hankinson's Ferry, the headquarters were changed on the 7th to Rocky Springs, and there we remained until the 11th. By that time McClernand and McPherson had advanced to within ten or twelve miles of the railroad which runs from Vicksburg to Jackson, and were lying nearly in an east and west line; and Sherman's entire corps had reached Hankinson's Ferry. Supplies which Grant had ordered from Milliken's Bend had also arrived. The order was now given to Sherman to destroy the bridge at Hankinson's Ferry, the rear guards were abandoned, and our communications cut. So complete was our isolation that it was ten days after we left Rocky Springs, on May 11th, before I was able to get another dispatch to Mr. Stanton.
This march toward Jackson proved to be no easy affair. More than one night I bivouacked on the ground in the rain after being all day in my saddle. The most comfortable night I had, in fact, was in a church of which the officers had taken possession. Having no pillow, I went up to the pulpit and borrowed the Bible for the night. Dr. H. L. Hewitt, who was medical director on Grant's staff, slept near me, and he always charged me afterward with stealing that Bible.
In spite of the roughness of our life, it was all of intense interest to me, particularly the condition of the people over whose country we were marching. A fact which impressed me was the total absence of men capable of bearing arms. Only old men and children remained. The young men were all in the army or had perished in it. The South was drained of its youth. An army of half a million with a white population of only five millions to draw upon, must soon finish the stock of raw material for soldiers. Another fact of moment was that we found men who had at the first sympathized with the rebellion, and even joined in it, now of their own accord rendering Grant the most valuable assistance, in order that the rebellion might be ended as speedily as possible, and something saved by the Southern people out of the otherwise total and hopeless ruin. "Slavery is gone, other property is mainly gone," they said, "but, for God's sake, let us save some relic of our former means of living."
In this forward movement the left of the army was ordered to hug the Big Black as closely as possible, while the right moved straight on Raymond. On the 12th, the right wing, under McPherson, met the enemy just west of Raymond. Grant at the time had his headquarters about at the center of the army, with Sherman's corps, some seven miles west of Raymond. I left him to go to the scene of the battle at once. It was a hard-fought engagement, lasting some three hours. McPherson drove the Confederates back to and through Raymond, and there stopped. The next day the advance of the army toward Jackson was continued. It rained heavily on the march and the roads were very heavy, but the troops were in the best of spirits at their successes and prospects. This work was a great improvement on digging canals and running batteries. On the afternoon of the 14th, about two and a half miles west of Jackson, McPherson and Sherman were temporarily stopped by the enemy, but he was quickly defeated, and that night we entered the capital of Mississippi.
At Jackson I received an important telegram from Stanton, though how it got to me there I do not remember. General Grant had been much troubled by the delay McClernand had caused at New Carthage, but he had felt reluctant to remove him as he had been assigned to his command by the President. My reports to the Secretary on the situation had convinced him that Grant ought to have perfect independence in the matter, so he telegraphed me as follows:
Washington, D.C.,
May 6, 1863.