WEST TENNESSEE
After coming out of the campaign of Kentucky, the cavalry forces were
employed to harass the enemy; and after the lapse of nearly sixty years,
it is exhilarating to my imagination to recall the wondrous part played
by General Forrest and his comparatively small command in that great
game of life and death.
While Morgan’s command was striking the key points of the Louisville and
Nashville Railroad to hamper the supply lines of Rosecrans at Nashville,
Forrest was performing the same service against the Mobile and Ohio and
the Memphis and Charleston, the supply lines of the enemy at Corinth,
Miss.
Leaving Chattanooga late in November, he hurried to West Tennessee,
crossing the Tennessee River at Clifton and pushing hurriedly on to the
Mobile and Ohio Railroad line. In rapid succession he engaged and
captured the garrisons of Jackson, Humboldt, Trenton, and Spring Creek,
with large supplies of arms and food.
In the same campaign we captured the garrison of Lexington, Tenn., and,
incidentally, Col. Robert G. Ingersoll, who in later years became the
great outstanding orator of the nation and its most brilliant agnostic,
or free religious thinker.
On account of the smallness of his command, General Forrest could only
hope to succeed by rapidity of movement; and this necessitated the
destruction of all captured property and the paroling of all prisoners.
Only a commander of genius and boldness could have coped with such a
situation as confronted Forrest. The territory in which he operated was
in the hands of the enemy, both lines of railroad controlled and guarded
by the Union armies. On the east was the Tennessee River, deep and cold,
and, ever hovering on its turbulent waters, a fleet of gunboats, such as
had carried terror to Henry and Donelson and Shiloh.
Thus hemmed within the encircling barriers of the Tennessee, the Ohio,
the Mississippi, and the army of Grant, this fearless Murat of the
Confederacy moved at will, a veritable flying scourge of death and
destruction, while the surprised and startled enemy made hasty and
widespread preparation for his capture; but the reincarnated spirit of
the Cavaliers rode as they reckoned, and, as in the movements of all
truly great commanders, the unexpected happened.
At a place called “Parker Cross-Roads,” opposite and west of Clifton, on
the Tennessee, the Union Army had a division of infantry and artillery
about to be reinforced by a brigade then on its way from Union City by
the Mobile and Ohio Railroad.
We were put in line of battle and ordered to an immediate attack against
the Parker Cross-Roads force, a portion of his command attacking in the
rear, while that portion with which I was fighting attacked the front.
Meantime a regiment had been sent to meet the column coming from Union
City. The Cross-Roads fight was waged in the open, and, considering the
numbers engaged, was as fierce and bloody as Shiloh or Perryville.
In the confusion resulting from being attacked front and rear, without
any knowledge of our numbers, the enemy, under a flag of truce sent by
General Forrest, with a demand for surrender, was undoubtedly at the
point of yielding, when a lightning-like surprise broke the calm where
the fighting had ceased.
The Union column from Union City had missed our regiment sent to meet
them, and had attacked our horse holders without warning and driven them
in great confusion into our fighting ranks. Hurriedly, General Forrest
concentrated his entire force, turned the horse holders into fighters,
and placed a small guard around the horses.
We immediately charged the newcomers and put them to flight, and then
headed for the Tennessee River. We never knew nor stopped to inquire
what the enemy, so near to the point of surrender, thought of our sudden
withdrawal.
When we had crossed the river on our way in, we had sunk our boats and
left them cabled, so that we could use them on the return; so, by
working all night, we recrossed with artillery and full command and drew
safely away from the zone of danger, only to enter another.
It is not necessary to the discerning reader to comment upon the genius
of Forrest displayed in this campaign. Great danger seemed to sharpen
his abilities and make surer his success.
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