THE CAMPAIGN OF SHILOH.
OPERATIONS AT ISLAND NO. 10 AND NEW MADRID--NAVAL BATTLE ON THE
MISSISSIPPI--THE BLOODIEST BATTLE WEST OF THE
ALLEGHANIES--COMMENCEMENT OF BATTLE OF SHILOH, SUNDAY, APRIL 6,
1862--TERRIBLE LOSSES ON BOTH SIDES--TRAGIC DEATH OF GENERAL ALBERT
SIDNEY JOHNSTON--GENERALS WALLACE, HINDMAN, AND GLADDEN
KILLED--GENERAL GRANT LEADING A REGIMENT--PUBLIC MISUNDERSTANDING
REGARDING THIS GREAT BATTLE--INTERESTING INCIDENTS OF THE FIGHT--FATE
OF CONFEDERACY DETERMINED AT SHILOH.
When the first line that the Confederates had attempted to establish
from the mountains to the Mississippi was broken by the battle of Mill
Springs and the fall of Forts Henry and Donelson, their forces at
Columbus were withdrawn down the river to the historic latitude of 36°
30'. Here the Mississippi makes a great sigmoid curve. In the first
bend is Island No. 10 (the islands are numbered from the mouth of the
Ohio southward); and at the second bend, on the Missouri side, is New
Madrid. Both of these places were fortified, under the direction of
Gen. Leonidas Polk, who had been Bishop of the Protestant Episcopal
diocese of Louisiana for twenty years before the war, but entered the
military service to give the Confederacy the benefit of his West Point
education. A floating dock was brought up from New Orleans, converted
into a floating battery, and anchored near the island; and there were
also eight gunboats commanded by Commodore George N. Hollins. The
works on the island were supplemented by batteries on the Tennessee
shore, back of which were impassable swamps. Thus the Mississippi was
sealed, and a position established for the left (or western extremity)
of a new line of defence.
[Illustration: CONSTRUCTING MILITARY ROAD THROUGH SWAMP.]
Early in March, 1862, a National army commanded by Gen. John Pope
moved down the west bank of the Mississippi against the position at
New Madrid. A reconnoissance in force demonstrated that the place
could be carried by storm, but could not be held, since the
Confederate gunboats were able (the river being then at high water) to
enfilade both the works and the approaches. General Pope went into
camp two miles from the river, and sent to Cairo for siege-guns,
meanwhile sending three regiments and a battery, under Gen. J. B.
Plummer, around to a point below New Madrid, where in the night they
sunk trenches for the field-guns and placed sharp-shooters at the edge
of the bank, and next day opened a troublesome fire on the passing
gunboats and transports. Four guns were forwarded promptly from Cairo,
being taken across the Mississippi and over a long stretch of swampy
ground where a road had been hastily prepared for the purpose, and
arriving at dusk on the 12th. That night Pope's forces crowded back
the Confederate pickets, dug trenches, and placed the guns in
position. The enemy's first intimation of what was going on was
obtained from a bombardment that opened at daylight. The firing was
kept up through the day, and some damage was inflicted on both sides;
but the next night, in the midst of a heavy storm, New Madrid was
evacuated. The National forces took possession, and immediately
changed the positions of the guns so as to command the river. On the
16th five Confederate gunboats attacked these batteries; but after one
boat had been sunk and some of the others damaged, they drew off. On
the 16th and 17th the National fleet of gunboats, under Commodore
Andrew H. Foote, engaged the batteries on Island No. 10, and a hundred
heavy guns were in action at once. The ramparts in some places had
been weakened by the wash of the river, and the great balls went right
through them. But the artillerymen stood to their work manfully, many
of them in water ankle deep; and though enormous shells exploded
within the forts, and one gun burst and another was dismounted, the
works were not reduced. A gun that burst in the fleet killed or
wounded fourteen men. The attack was renewed from day to day, and one
of the batteries was cleared of troops, but with no decisive effect.
At the suggestion of Gen. Schuyler Hamilton, a canal was cut across
the peninsula formed by the bend of the river above New Madrid. This
task was confided to a regiment of engineers commanded by Col. Josiah
W. Bissell, and was completed in nineteen days. The course was
somewhat tortuous, and the whole length of the canal was twelve miles.
Half of the distance lay through a thick forest standing in deep
water; but by an ingenious contrivance the trunks of the trees were
sawed off four and a half feet below the surface, and a channel fifty
feet wide and four feet deep was secured, through which transports
could be passed.
On the night of April 4th the gunboat _Carondelet_, Commander Henry
Walke, ran down past the batteries of Island No. 10, escaping serious
damage, and in the night of the 6th the _Pittsburg_ performed the same
feat. With the help of these to silence the batteries on the opposite
shore, Pope crossed in force on the 7th, and moved rapidly down the
little peninsula. The {100} greater part of the Confederate troops
that had been holding the island now attempted to escape southward,
but were caught between Pope's army and an impassable swamp, and
surrendered. General Pope's captures in the entire campaign were three
generals, two hundred and seventy-three officers, and six thousand
seven hundred men, besides one hundred and fifty-eight guns, seven
thousand muskets, one gunboat, a floating battery, six steamers, and a
considerable quantity of stores.
[Illustration: SURRENDER OF CONFEDERATE FORCES AFTER RETREAT FROM
ISLAND No. 10.]
[Illustration: REAR-ADMIRAL ANDREW H. FOOTE.]
[Illustration: LIEUTENANT-GENERAL LEONIDAS POLK, C. S. A.]
On the very day of this bloodless victory, a little log church in
southwestern Tennessee gave name to the bloodiest battle that has been
fought west of the Alleghanies--Chickamauga being rather _in_ the
mountains. At Corinth, in northern Mississippi, the Memphis and
Charleston Railroad crosses the Mobile and Ohio. This gave that point
great strategic importance, and it was fortified accordingly and held
by a large Confederate force, which was commanded by Gen. Albert
Sidney Johnston (who must not be confounded with the Confederate Gen.
Joseph E. Johnston). His lieutenants were Gens. G. T. Beauregard,
Braxton Bragg, and William J. Hardee. General Grant, who had nearly
forty thousand men under his command, and was about to be joined by
Gen. Don Carlos Buell coming from Nashville with as many more,
proposed to move against Corinth and capture the place.
On Sunday, April 6th, Grant's main force was at Pittsburg Landing, on
the west bank of the Tennessee, twenty miles north of Corinth. One
division, under Gen. Lew Wallace, was at Crump's Landing, five miles
farther north. The advance division of Buell's army had reached the
river, opposite the landings, and the remainder was a march behind.
For some days Johnston had been moving northward to attack Grant, and
there had been skirmishing between the outposts. Early on the morning
of the 6th he came within striking distance, and made a sudden and
heavy attack. Grant's line was about two miles long, the left resting
on Lick Creek, an impassable stream that flows into the Tennessee
above Pittsburg Landing, and the right on Owl Creek, which flows in
below. Gen. Benjamin M. Prentiss's division was on the left, Gen. John
A. McClernand's in the centre, and Gen. William T. Sherman's on the
right. Gen. Stephen A. Hurlbut's was in reserve on the left, and Gen.
C. F. Smith's (now commanded by W. H. L. Wallace) on the right. There
were no {101} intrenchments. The ground was undulating, with patches
of woods alternating with cleared fields, some of which were under
cultivation and others abandoned and overgrown with bushes. A ridge,
on which stood Shiloh church, formed an important key-point in
Sherman's front.
General Grant, in his headquarters at Savannah, down the river, heard
the firing while he was at breakfast, and hurried up to Pittsburg
Landing. He had expected to be attacked, if at all, at Crump's
Landing, and he now ordered Lew Wallace, with his five thousand men,
to leave that place and march at once to the right of the line at
Shiloh; but Wallace took the wrong road, and did not arrive till dark.
Neither did Gen. William Nelson's advance division of General Buell's
army cross the river till evening.
The attack began at daybreak, and was made with tremendous force and
in full confidence of success. The nature of the ground made
regularity of movement impossible, and the battle was rather a series
of assaults by separate columns, now at one part of the line and now
at another, which were kept up all day with wonderful persistence.
Probably no army ever went into action with more perfect confidence in
itself and its leaders than Johnston's. Beauregard had told them they
should sleep that night in the camps of the enemy, and they did. He
also told them that he would water his horse in the Tennessee, but he
did not. The heaviest attacks fell upon Sherman and McClernand, whose
men stood up to the work with unflinching courage and disputed every
inch of ground. But they were driven back by overwhelming numbers,
which the Confederate commanders poured upon them without the
slightest regard to losses. The Sixth Mississippi regiment lost three
hundred men out of its total of four hundred and twenty-five, and the
Eighteenth Louisiana lost two hundred and seven. Sherman's men lost
their camps in the morning, and retired upon one new line of defence
after another, till they had been crowded back more than a mile; but
all the while they clung to the road and bridge by which they were
expecting Lew Wallace to come to their assistance. General Grant says
of an open field on this part of the line, over which repeated charges
were made, that it was "so covered with dead that it would have been
possible to walk across the clearing in any direction, stepping on
dead bodies, without a foot touching the ground. On our side National
and Confederate troops were mingled together in about equal
proportions; but on the remainder of the field nearly all were
Confederates. On one part, which had evidently not been ploughed for
several years, bushes had grown up, some to the height of eight or ten
feet. Not one of these was left standing unpierced by bullets. The
smaller ones were all cut down."
Many of the troops were under fire for the first time; but Sherman's
wonderful military genius largely made up for this deficiency. One
bullet struck Sherman in the hand, another grazed his shoulder,
another went through his hat, and several of his horses were killed. A
bullet struck and shattered the scabbard of General Grant's sword.
Gen. W. H. L. Wallace was mortally wounded. On the other side, Gens.
Adley H. Gladden and Thomas C. Hindman were killed; at about half-past
two o'clock General Johnston, placing himself at the head of a brigade
that was reluctant to attempt another charge, was struck in the leg by
a minie-ball. The wound need not have been mortal; but he would not
leave the field, and after a time bled to death. The command then
devolved upon General Beauregard.
In the afternoon a gap occurred between General Prentiss's division
and the rest of the line, and the Confederates were prompt to take
advantage of it. Rushing with a heavy force through this gap, and at
the same time attacking his left, they doubled up both flanks, and
captured that general and two thousand two hundred of his men. On this
part of the field the day was saved by Col. J. D. Webster, of General
Grant's staff, who rapidly got twenty guns into position and checked
the Confederate advance. They then attempted to come in on the extreme
left, along the river, by crossing a ravine. But more guns were
brought up, and placed on a ridge that commanded this ravine, and at
the same time the gunboats _Tyler_ and _Lexington_ moved up to a point
opposite and enfiladed it with their fire. The result to the
Confederates was nothing but a useless display of valor and a heavy
loss.
[Illustration: A FEDERAL GUNBOAT.]
[Illustration: BRIGADIER-GENERAL GEORGE W. CULLUM.]
[Illustration: MAJOR-GENERAL SCHUYLER HAMILTON.]
{102} [Illustration: FINAL STAND OF THE ARMY OF GENERAL GRANT, APRIL
6, 1862, NEAR PITTSBURG LANDING.]
The uneven texture of Grant's army had been shown when two green
colonels led their green regiments from the field at the first fire;
and the {103} stragglers and deserters, having no opportunity to
scatter over the country, necessarily huddled themselves together
under the bank of the river at the landing, where they presented a
pitiful appearance. General Grant says there were nearly five thousand
of them. There was about an equal number of deserters and stragglers
from Johnston's army; but the nature of the ground was not such as to
concentrate them where the eye could take them all in at one grand
review. With the exception of the break when Prentiss was captured,
Grant's line of battle was maintained all day, though it was steadily
forced back and thirty guns were lost.
Beauregard discontinued the attack at nightfall, when his right was
repelled at the ravine, intending to renew it and finish the victory
in the morning. He knew that Buell was expected, but did not know that
he was so near.
Lew Wallace was now in position on the right, and Nelson on the left,
and all night long the boats were plying back and forth across the
Tennessee, bringing over Buell's army. A fire in the woods, which
sprang up about dusk, threatened to add to the horrors by roasting
many of the wounded alive; but a merciful rain extinguished it, and
the two armies lay out that night in the storm. A portion of the
Confederates were sheltered by the captured tents, but on the other
hand they were annoyed by the shells constantly thrown among them by
the gunboats.
At daylight Grant assumed the offensive, the fresh troops on his right
and left moving first to the attack. Beauregard now knew that Buell
had arrived, and he must have known also that there could be but one
result; yet he made a stubborn fight, mainly for the purpose of
holding the road that ran by Shiloh church, by which alone he could
conduct an orderly retreat. The complete upsetting of the Confederate
plans, caused by the death of Johnston, the arrival of Buell, and
Grant's promptness in assuming the offensive, is curiously suggested
by a passage in the report of one of the Confederate brigade
commanders: "I was ordered by General Ruggles to form on the extreme
left, and rest my left on Owl Creek. While proceeding to execute this
order, I was ordered to move by the rear of the main line to support
the extreme right of General Hardee's line. Having taken my position
to support General Hardee's right, I was again ordered by General
Beauregard to advance and occupy the crest of a ridge in the edge of
an old field. My line was just formed in this position when General
Polk ordered me forward to support his line. When moving to the
support of General Polk, an order reached me from General Beauregard
to report to him with my command at his headquarters."
[Illustration: SHILOH LOG CHAPEL, WHERE THE BATTLE OF SHILOH
COMMENCED, APRIL 6, 1862.]
The fighting was of the same general description as on the previous
day, except that the advantage was now with the National troops.
Sherman was ordered to advance his command and recapture his camps. As
these were about Shiloh church, and that was the point that Beauregard
was most anxious to hold, the struggle there was intense and bloody.
About the same time, early in the afternoon, Grant and Beauregard did
the same thing: each led a charge by two regiments that had lost their
commanders. Beauregard's charge was not successful; Grant's was, and
the two regiments that he launched with a cheer against the
Confederate line broke it, and began the rout. {104} Beauregard posted
a rear guard in a strong position, and withdrew his army, leaving his
dead on the field, while Grant captured about as many guns on the
second day as he had lost on the first. There was no serious attempt
at pursuit, owing mainly to the heavy rain and the condition of the
roads. The losses on both sides had been enormous. On the National
side the official figures are: 1,754 killed, 8,408 wounded, 2,885
missing; total, 13,047. On the Confederate side they are: 1,728
killed, 8,012 wounded, 957 missing; total, 10,699. General Grant says:
"This estimate must be incorrect. We buried, by actual count, more of
the enemy's dead in front of the divisions of McClernand and Sherman
alone than are here reported, and four thousand was the estimate of
the burial parties for the whole field." At all events, the loss was
large enough to gratify the ill-wishers of the American people, who
were looking on with grim satisfaction to see them destroy one
another. The losses were the same, in round numbers, as at the
historic battle of Blenheim, though the number of men engaged was
fewer by one-fourth. If we should read in to-morrow's paper that by
some disaster every man, woman, and child in the city of Concord,
N. H., had been either killed or injured, and in the next day's paper
that the same thing had happened in Montgomery, Ala., the loss of life
and limb would only equal what took place on the mournful field of
Shiloh.
[Illustration: GENERAL ALBERT SIDNEY JOHNSTON, C. S. A.]
[Illustration: GENERAL BRAXTON BRAGG, C. S. A.]
[Illustration: MAJOR-GENERAL DON CARLOS BUELL.]
[Illustration: MAJOR-GENERAL LEW WALLACE.]
General Grant, in the first article that he ever wrote for
publication, remarks that "the battle of Shiloh, or Pittsburg Landing,
has been perhaps less understood, or, to state the case more
accurately, more persistently misunderstood, than any other engagement
between National and Confederate troops during the entire rebellion.
Correct reports of the battle have been published, but all of these
appeared long subsequent to the close of the rebellion, and after
public opinion had been most erroneously formed." No battle is ever
fought that it is not for somebody's interest to misrepresent. In the
case of Shiloh there were peculiar and complicated reasons both for
intentional misrepresentation and for innocent error. The plans of the
commanders on both sides were to some extent thwarted and changed by
unexpected events. One commander was killed on the first day, and his
admirers naturally speculate upon the different results that might
have been attained if he had lived. The ground was so broken as to
divide the engagement practically into several separate actions, and
what was true of one might not be true of another. The peculiarity of
the position also brought together in one place, under the river-bank,
all who from fright or demoralization fled to the rear of the National
army, which produced upon those who saw them an effect altogether
different from that of the usual retreating and straggling across the
whole breadth of a battle line. Then there was the circumstance of
Buell's army coming up at the end of the first day, and not coming up
before that, which could hardly fail to give rise to somewhat of
jealousy and recrimination. And finally this action encounters to an
unusual extent that criticism which reads by the light of
after-events, but forgets that this was wanting to the actors whom it
criticises.
The point on which popular opinion was perhaps most widely and
persistently wrong was, that the defeat of the first day arose from
the fact that Grant's army was completely surprised. Public opinion,
throughout the war, was formed in advance of the official reports of
generals in three ways. There were many press correspondents with
every army, and the main purpose of most of them was to construct an
interesting story and get it into print as soon as possible. The
National Government adopted the wise policy of giving the armies in
the field such mail facilities as would keep the soldiers in close
touch with their homes, and they wrote millions of letters every year.
All that a soldier needed was some scrap of paper and some sort of pen
or pencil. If he happened to have no postage stamp, he had only to
mark his missive "Soldier's letter," and it would be carried in the
mails to its destination, and the postage collected on delivery. After
a battle every surviving soldier was especially anxious to let his
family know that he had escaped any casualty, and he naturally filled
up his letter with such particulars as had most impressed him in that
small part of the field that he had seen, and sometimes with such
exaggerated accounts as in the first excitement had reached {105} him
from other parts. Finally, the journalists were not few who assumed to
be accomplished strategists, and talked learnedly in their editorial
columns of the errors of generals and the way that battles should have
been fought. And some of them had political reasons for writing up
certain generals and writing down certain others.
[Illustration: MAP SHOWING ROADS AND POSITION OF CAMPS BEFORE AND
DURING THE BATTLE OF SHILOH.]
A good instance of innocent misapprehension is probably furnished in
what Lieutenant-Colonel Graves, of the Twelfth Michigan, wrote: "On
Saturday General Prentiss's division was reviewed. After the review
Major Powell, of the Twenty-fifth Missouri, came to me and said he saw
Butternuts [Confederate soldiers] looking through the underbrush at
the parade--about a dozen. Upon the representation of Major Powell and
myself, General Prentiss ordered out one company of the Twelfth
Michigan as an advance picket. About 8.30 o'clock Captain Johnson
reported from the front that he could see long lines of campfires,
hear bugle sounds and drums, which I reported to General Prentiss, and
he remarked that the company would be taken if left there; that it was
merely a reconnoissance of the enemy in force, and ordered the company
in. About ten o'clock I went with Captain Johnson to the tent of
General Prentiss, and the captain told him what he saw. The general
remarked that we need not be alarmed, that everything was all right.
To me it did not appear all right. Major Powell, myself, and several
other officers went to the headquarters of Colonel Peabody, commanding
our brigade, and related to him what had transpired. He ordered out
two companies from the Twelfth Michigan and two from the Twenty-fifth
Missouri, under command of Major Powell. About three o'clock in the
morning the advance of the enemy came up with this body of men, who
fought them till daylight, gradually falling back till they met their
regiments, which had advanced about fifty rods. There the regiments
met the enemy, and fought till overpowered, when we fell back to our
color line and re-formed. General Prentiss was so loath to believe
that the enemy was in force, that our division was not organized for
defence, but each regiment acted upon its own hook, so far as I was
able to observe. The point I wish to make is this: that, had it not
been for these four companies which were sent out by Colonel Peabody,
our whole division would have been taken in their tents, and the day
would have been lost. I shall always think that Colonel Peabody saved
the battle of Shiloh."
[Illustration: MAJOR-GENERAL WILLIAM J. HARDEE, C. S. A.]
[Illustration: MAJOR-GENERAL S. A. HURLBUT.]
[Illustration: MAJOR-GENERAL B. M. PRENTISS.]
{106} [Illustration: ADVANCE OF THE FEDERAL TROOPS ON CORINTH--GENERAL
HURLBUT'S DIVISION FORCING THEIR WAY THROUGH THE MUD.]
{107} [Illustration: GENERAL ULYSSES S. GRANT.]
Such was the testimony and opinion, undoubtedly honest, of an officer
of a green regiment which there for the first time participated in a
battle. The truth was, the generals of the National forces were not
ignorant of the near approach of the enemy. Reconnoissances,
especially in Sherman's front, had shown that. They were only waiting
for all their forces to come up to make an attack themselves, and when
Buell arrived they did make that attack and were successful. General
Prentiss's division, so far from being unorganized, kept its lines,
received the shock of battle, and stood up manfully to the work before
it until the divisions on both sides of it drew back, leaving its
flanks exposed, when the Confederates poured through the gaps, struck
it on both flanks at once, and captured a large part of it. On the
ground along its line and in its front more men were struck down in an
hour than on any other spot of equal extent, in the same time, in the
whole war.
The Confederates were successful on the first day, not because of any
surprise, but simply because they had the greater number of men and
persistently hurled them, regardless of cost, against the National
lines. There was also one other reason, which would not have existed
later in the war. After the first year no army would occupy any
position on the field without intrenching. The soldiers on both sides
learned how, in a little while, to throw up a simple breastwork of
earth that would stop a large proportion of the bullets that an enemy
might fire at them. Grant's army at Shiloh had its flanks well
protected by impassable streams, and if it had had a simple breastwork
along its front, such as could have been constructed in an hour, the
first day's disaster might have been averted. As it was, the men
fought in the open field, with no protection but the occasional
shelter of a tree trunk, and at one point a slightly sunken road. The
habit of Grant's mind was such that he always thought of his army as
assuming the offensive and hence having no use for intrenchments, and
his green regiments did not yet appreciate the power of the spade.
Shiloh was a severe lesson to them all.
[Illustration: A FIELD HOSPITAL.]
Some of the most interesting incidents of the battle are given by Col.
Douglas Putnam, Jr., of the Ninety-second Ohio Infantry, in a paper
read before the Ohio Commandery of the Loyal Legion: "With the consent
of General Grant, I was permitted to accompany him to the field as a
volunteer aid. As we approached Crump's Landing, where the division of
Gen. Lew Wallace was stationed, the boat was rounded in and the
engines stopped. General Wallace, then standing on the bank, said, 'My
division is in line, waiting for orders.' Grant's reply was, that as
soon as he got to Pittsburg Landing and learned where the attack was,
he would send him orders.... After getting a horse, I started with
Rawlins to find General Grant; and to my inquiry as to where we would
likely find him, Rawlins's reply, characteristic of the man, was,
'We'll find him where the firing is heaviest.' As we proceeded, we met
the increasing signs of battle, while the dropping of the bullets
about us, on the leaves, led me in my inexperience to ask if it were
not raining, to which Rawlins tersely said, 'Those are bullets,
Douglas.' When, on meeting a horse through which a cannon-ball had
gone, walking along with protruding bowels, I asked permission to
shoot him and end his misery, Rawlins said, 'He belongs to the
quartermaster's department; better let them attend to it.' We soon
found General Grant. He was sending his aids in different directions,
as occasion made it necessary, and he himself visited his division
commanders one by one. He wore his full uniform, with the
major-general's buff sash, which made him very conspicuous both to our
own men and to those of the enemy. Lieut.-Col. J. B. McPherson, acting
chief of staff, remonstrated with him, as did also Rawlins, for so
unnecessarily exposing himself, as he went just in the rear of our
line of battle; but he said he wanted to see and know what was going
on. About eleven o'clock he met General Sherman on what was called
Sherman's drill-ground, near the old peach orchard. The meeting was
attended with but few words. Sherman's stock had become pulled around
until the part that should have been in front rested under one of his
ears, while his whole appearance indicated hard and earnest work. The
bullets were plenteous here. Sherman told Grant how many horses he had
had killed {108} under him, showing him also the marks of bullets in
his clothing. When Grant left Sherman, I think I was the only aid with
him. Riding toward the right, the General saw a body of troops coming
up from the direction of Crump's Landing, and exclaimed with great
delight and satisfaction, 'Now we are all right, all right--there's
Wallace.' He was of course mistaken, as the troops he saw were not
those he so earnestly looked for, and of whose assistance he was
beginning to feel the need. About two o'clock, at one point were
gathered General Grant and several of his staff. The group consisted
of Grant, McPherson, Rawlins, Webster, and others. This evidently drew
the attention of the enemy, and they received rather more than a due
share of the fire. Colonel McPherson's horse having been shot under
him, I gave him mine, and under directions went to the river on foot.
The space under the bank was literally packed by thousands, I suppose,
of men who had from inexperience and fright 'lost their grip,' or were
both mentally and physically, as we say, let down--however, only
temporarily. To them it seemed that the day was lost, that the deluge
was upon them. The Tennessee River in front, swamps to the right and
swamps to the left, they could go no farther, and there lay down and
waited. I remember well seeing a mounted officer, carrying a United
States flag, riding back and forth on top of the bank, pleading and
entreating in this wise: 'Men, for God's sake, for your country's
sake, for your own sake, come up here, form a line, and make one more
stand.' The appeal fell on listless ears. No one seemed to respond,
and the only reply I heard was some one saying, 'That man talks well,
don't he?' But eighteen hours afterward these same men had come to
themselves, were refreshed by meeting other troops, and assured that
all was not lost, that there was something still left to fight for,
and helped also by the magic touch of the elbow, they did valiant
service. A group of officers was gathered around General Grant about
dusk, at a smouldering fire of hay just on the top of the grade. The
rain was falling, atmosphere murky, and ground covered with mud and
water. Colonel McPherson rode up, and Grant said, 'Well, Mac, how is
it?' He gave him a report of the condition as it seemed to him, which
was, in short, that at least one-third of his army was _hors de
combat_, and the rest much disheartened. To this the General made no
reply, and McPherson continued, 'Well, General Grant, under this
condition of affairs, what do you propose to do, sir? Shall I make
preparations for retreat?' The reply came quick and short: 'Retreat?
No! I propose to attack at daylight, and whip them.'"
The same writer tells of a conversation that he held with General
Beauregard some years after the war. "To my query that it had always
been a mystery why he stopped the battle when he did Sunday night,
when the advantage, on the whole, seemed to be with him, and when he
had an hour or more of daylight, General Beauregard replied that there
were two reasons: first, his men were, as he put it, 'out of hand,'
had been fighting since early morn, were worn out, and also
demoralized by the flush of victory in gathering the stores and
sutlers' supplies found in our camps. As one man said, 'You fellows
went to war with cheese, pigs' feet, dates, pickles--things we rebs
had forgotten the sight of.' 'In the second place,' he said, 'I
thought I had General Grant just where I wanted him, and could finish
him up in the morning.'"
[Illustration: MAJOR-GENERAL JONES M. WITHERS, C. S. A.]
[Illustration: MAJOR-GENERAL THOMAS L. CRITTENDEN.]
[Illustration: MAJOR-GENERAL JOHN A. McCLERNAND.]
[Illustration: MAJOR-GENERAL GEORGE B. CRITTENDEN, C. S. A.]
After the battle, General Halleck took command in person, and
proceeded to lay siege to Corinth, to capture it by regular
approaches. Both he and Beauregard were reinforced, till each had
about one hundred thousand men. Halleck gradually closed in about the
place, till in the night of May 29th Beauregard evacuated it, and on
the morning of the 30th Sherman's soldiers entered the town.
Some military critics hold that the fate of the Confederacy was
determined on the field of Shiloh. They point out the fact that after
that battle there was nothing to prevent the National armies at the
West from going all the way to the Gulf, or--as they ultimately
did--to the sea. In homely phrase, the back door of the Confederacy
was broken down, and, however stubbornly the front door in Virginia
might be defended, it was only a question of time when some great
army, coming in by the rear, should cut off the supplies of the troops
that held Richmond, and compel their surrender. Those who are disposed
to give history a romantic turn narrow it down to the death of General
Johnston, declaring that in his fall the possibility of Southern
independence was lost, and if he had lived the result would have been
reversed. General Grant appears to dispose of their theory when he
points out the fact that Johnston was killed while {109} leading a
forlorn hope, and remarks that there is no victory for anybody till
the battle is ended, and the battle of Shiloh was not ended till the
close of the second day. But, indeed, there is no reason why the fatal
moment should not be carried back to the time when the line of defence
from the mountains to the Mississippi was broken through at Mill
Spring and Fort Donelson, or even to the time when the Confederates,
because of Kentucky's refusal to leave the Union, were prevented from
establishing their frontier at the Ohio. The reason why progress in
conquering the Confederacy was more rapid at the West than at the East
is not to be found so much in any difference in men as in topography.
At the West, the armies moving southward followed the courses of the
rivers, and their opponents were obliged to maintain artificial lines
of defence; but the Eastern armies were called upon to cross the
streams and attack natural lines of defence.
Back of all this, in the logic of the struggle, is the fact that no
defensive attitude can be maintained permanently. The belligerent that
cannot prevent his own territory from becoming the seat of war must
ultimately surrender his cause, no matter how valiant his individual
soldiers may be, or how costly he may make it for the invader; or, to
state it affirmatively, a belligerent that can carry the war into the
enemy's country, and keep it there, will ultimately succeed. In most
wars, the side on whose soil the battles were fought has been the
losing side; and this is an important lesson to bear in mind when it
becomes necessary to determine the great moral question of
responsibility for prolonging a hopeless contest.