Volume II Part 3 (2/2)
”JEFFERSON DAVIS.”
Let us now review the events which had brought such unmeasured censure on General Johnston for some months preceding this correspondence. We have seen him, with a force numerically much inferior to that of the enemy in his front, holding the position of Bowling Green, and, by active operations of detached commands, keeping up to foe and friend the impression that he had a large army in position. With self-sacrificing fort.i.tude he remained silent under reproaches for not advancing to attack the enemy. When Forts Donelson and Henry were more immediately threatened, he gave reenforcements from his small command until his own line became more like one of skirmishers than an intrenched line of battle; and when those forts were surrendered, and his position became both untenable and useless, he withdrew in such order and with such skill that his retreat was unmolested by the enemy. Though he continued to be the subject of unreasoning vituperation, he sought not to justify himself by blaming others, or telling what he would have done if his Government had sent him the arms and munitions he asked for, but which his Government he learned did not possess.
There are yet those who, self-a.s.sured, demand why Johnston did not go himself to Donelson and Henry, and why his forces were not there concentrated. A slight inspection of the map would suffice to show that, Bowling Green abandoned, the direct road to Nashville would be open to the advance of Buell's army. Then the forts, if held, would cease to answer their purpose, and, being isolated, and also between hostile armies above and below, would be not only valueless but only temporarily tenable; and of his critics it may be asked, Who else than himself could, with the small force retained at Bowling Green, have held the enemy in check so long, and at last have retired without disaster?
To collect the widely separated troops of his command so as to form an army which might offer battle to the invading foe was a problem which must have been impossible, if the organized armies by which he was threatened had been guided by a capacity equal to his own. It was done, and, with the genius of a great soldier, he seized the opportunity, by the rapid combination of new levies and of forces never before united, to attack the armies of the enemy in detail while they were endeavoring to form a junction.
The Southwestern States presented a field peculiarly favorable for the application of a new power in war. Deep rivers, with banks frequently but little elevated above the water, traverse the country.
On these rivers iron-plated steamboats with heavy guns may move with a rapidity incomparably greater than that of marching armies. It is as if forts, with armaments, garrison, and stores, were endowed with locomotion more swift and enduring than that of cavalry.
The Ohio, Mississippi, c.u.mberland, and Tennessee Rivers all were in the field of General Johnston's operations, and at the stage of water most suited to naval purposes. Apart from the heavy guns which could thus be brought to bear at interior places upon an army having only field-artillery, the advantage of rapid transportation for troops and supplies can hardly be over-estimated. It has been seen how these advantages were utilized by the enemy at Henry and Donelson, and not less did they avail him at s.h.i.+loh.
As has been elsewhere explained, the condition of the South did not enable the Confederacy to meet the enemy on the water except at great odds.
If it be asked, ”Why did not General Johnston wait until the enemy marched from the river instead of attacking him at s.h.i.+loh or Pittsburg Landing?” the answer is, ”That would have been to delay until the junction of the enemy's armies had been effected.” To fight them in detail, it was necessary to attack the first where it lay, backed by its gunboats. That sound judgment and soldierly daring went hand in hand in this attack the sequel demonstrated.
Meantime some active operations had taken place in that part of General Johnston's command west of the Mississippi River. Detached conflicts with the enemy had been fought by the small forces under Generals Price and McCulloch, but no definite result had followed.
General Earl Van Dorn had been subsequently a.s.signed to the command, and a.s.sumed it on January 29, 1862. General Curtis was then in command of the enemy's forces, numbering about twelve thousand men.
He had hara.s.sed General Price on his retreat to Fayetteville, Arkansas, and then had fallen back to Sugar Creek, where he proposed to make a stand. Van Dorn, immediately on his arrival at the Confederate camps on Boston Mountain, prepared to attack Curtis. His first movement, however, was to intercept General Sigel, then at Bentonville with sixteen thousand men. The want of cooperation in Van Dorn's forces enabled Sigel to escape. Curtis thus concentrated his forces at Sugar Creek, and, instead of taking him in detail, Van Dorn was obliged to meet his entire army. By a circuitous route, he led Price's army against the enemy's rear, moving McCulloch against the right flank; but his progress was so slow and embarra.s.sed, that the enemy heard of it in season to make his dispositions accordingly.
The battle of Elkhorn, or Pea Ridge, was fought on the morning of March 5th. Van Dorn reported his force to be fourteen thousand men, and Curtis puts his force at about ten thousand. Van Dorn, with Price's division, encountered Carr's division which had already advanced, but was driven back steadily and with heavy loss.
Meanwhile, McCulloch's command met a division under Osterhaus, and, after a sharp, quick struggle, swept it away. Pus.h.i.+ng forward through the shrub-oak, his wide-extended line met Sigel's, Asboth's, and Davis's divisions. Here on the ragged spurs of the hills ensued a fearful combat. In the crisis of the struggle, McCulloch, das.h.i.+ng forward to reconnoiter, fell a victim to a sharpshooter. Almost at the same moment, McIntosh, his second in command, fell while charging a battery of the enemy with a regiment of Texas cavalry. Without direction or leader, the shattered lines of our forces left the field to rally, after a wide circuit, on Price's division. When Van Dorn heard of this misfortune, he urged his attack, pressing back the enemy until night closed the b.l.o.o.d.y combat. Van Dorn's headquarters were then at Elkhorn Tavern, where the enemy's headquarters had been in the morning. Each army was now on its opponent's line of communication. Van Dorn found his troops much disorganized and exhausted, short of ammunition, and without food, and made his arrangements to retreat. The wagon-trains and all the men not effective for the coming battle were started by a circuitous route for Van Buren. The effectives remained to cover the retreat. The battle was renewed at 7 A.M., and raged until 10 A.M. The gallant General Henry Little had the covering line with his own and Rives's Missouri brigades; this stout rear-guard holding off the whole army of the enemy. The trains, artillery, and most of the army were by that time well on the road. The order was given to the Missourians to withdraw, and ”the gallant fellows faced about with cheers” retired steadily, and encamped ten miles from the battle-field at three o'clock. There was no real pursuit. The attack had failed. Van Dorn put his loss at six hundred killed and wounded, and two hundred prisoners. Curtis reported his loss at two hundred and three killed, nine hundred and seventy-two wounded, and a hundred and seventy-six missing--total, thirteen hundred and fifty-one.[12]
The object of Van Dorn had been to effect a diversion in behalf of General Johnston. This failed; but the enemy was badly crippled, and soon fell back to Missouri, of which he still retained possession.
General Van Dorn was now ordered to join General Johnston by the quickest route. Yet only one of his regiments arrived in time to be present at the battle of s.h.i.+loh. As has been already stated, General Beauregard left Nashville on February 14th to take charge in West Tennessee, and made his headquarters at Jackson, Tennessee, on February 17th. He was somewhat prostrated by sickness, which partially disabled him through the campaign. The two grand divisions of his army were commanded by the able Generals Bragg and Polk. On March 26th he permanently removed to Corinth. Under his orders the evacuation of Columbus by General Polk, and the establishment of a new line resting on New Madrid, Island No. 10, and Humboldt, was completed. On March 2d Brigadier-General J. P. McCown, an ”old army”
officer, was a.s.signed to the command of Island No. 10, forty miles below Columbus, whither he removed his division. A. P. Stewart's brigade was sent to New Madrid. At these points some seven thousand troops were a.s.sembled, and the remainder marched under General Cheatham to Union City. General Polk says:
”In five days we moved the acc.u.mulations of six months, taking with us all our commissary and quartermaster's stores--an amount sufficient to supply my whole command for eight months--all our powder and other ammunition and ordnance stores, excepting a few shot, and gun-carriages, and every heavy gun in the fort, except two thirty-two pounders and three carronades in a remote outwork, which had been rendered useless.”
The movement of the enemy up the Tennessee River commenced on March 10th. General C. F. Smith led the advance, with a new division under General Sherman. On the 13th Smith a.s.sembled four divisions at Savannah, on the west bank of the Tennessee, at the Great Bend. The ultimate design was to ma.s.s the forces of Grant and Buell against our army at Corinth. Buell was still in the occupation of Nashville. On the 16th Sherman disembarked at Pittsburg Landing, and made a reconnaissance to Monterey, nearly half-way to Corinth. On the next day General Grant took command. Two more divisions were added, and he a.s.sembled his army near Pittsburg Landing, which was the most advantageous base for a movement against Corinth. Here it lay inactive until the battle of s.h.i.+loh.
The Tennessee flows northwest for some distance, until, a little west of Hamburg, it takes its final bend to the north. Here two small streams, Owl and Lick Creeks, flowing nearly parallel, somewhat north of east, from three to five miles apart, empty into the Tennessee.
Owl Creek forms the northern limit of the ridge, which Lick Creek bounds on the south. These streams, rising some ten or twelve miles back, toward Corinth, were bordered near their mouths by swamps filled with backwater from the Tennessee, and impa.s.sable except where the roads crossed them.
[Map used by the Confederate generals at s.h.i.+loh]
The inclosed s.p.a.ce is a rolling table-land, about one hundred feet above the river-level, with its water-shed lying near Lick Creek, and either slope broken by deep and frequent ravines draining into two streams. The acclivities were covered with forests, and often thick set with undergrowth. Pittsburg Landing, containing three or four log-cabins, was situated about midway between the mouths of the creeks, in the narrow mora.s.s that borders the Tennessee. It was three or four miles below Hamburg, six or seven above Savannah, the depot of the enemy on the right bank, and twenty-two miles from Corinth.
Thus the position of the enemy was naturally strong. With few and difficult approaches, guarded on either flank by impa.s.sable streams and mora.s.ses, protected by a succession of ravines and acclivities, commanded by eminences to the rear, it seemed safe against attack, and easy to defend. No defensive works were constructed.
[Footnote 11: Colonel R. W. Woolley, In ”New Orleans Picayune,” March, 1863.]
[Footnote 12: ”The Life of Gen. Albert Sidney Johnston,” by his son.]
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