Captain Yeger's saber flashed in the sun. Two squadrons of rebel cavalrymen opened fire on the Bear Creek bridge. And the single company of Harris' brigade, 28th Mississippi cavalry spurred their horses forward, four abreast, down the narrow fenced road, directly into the open mouth of a 12 inch howitzer. The cannon belched fire and smoke. Hundreds of supersonic lead balls filled the air. And 100 Iowa Yankee carbines barked death.
Twice the Mississippi rebels charged, and twice the Iowa boys forced them back. But then, seeing the Yankees pulling the ugly little gun to the west side of the bridge, Captain Yerger ordered this men forward a third time. And this time the riders in butternut brown and gray scattered the blue clad gunners and captured the ugly little cannon. In victory the rebels barely notice the Yankees had fired the bridge, and it would soon be unusable.
History would insist that this 22 June, 1863 skirmish at Bear Creek, just west of the Birdsong Ferry over the Big Black River, was of importance only to the 13 Americans killed on both sides – including the brave Captain Yeger – and the 32 wounded , and, of course to the 40 horses killed. The bridge would be repaired, and that would take just a little time . But it did have a larger meaning to at least two other men.
As June slipped away, General Joseph Johnston's strongest unit, Major General William Henry Talbot Walker's 8,000 man division, was station 20 miles northwest of Canton, Mississippi at the crossroads village of Vernon. From there Walker could guard against a Yankee end run toward Yazoo City. And should Johnston take the offensive, as President Jefferson Davis had ordered, the first step for Walker would be a march 3 miles due west to Bogue Chitto – in the Choctaw language, Big Creek – and then another 4 mile march to the Big Black River at Birdsong Ferry, 10 miles north of the Big Black River Bridge battlefield.
Just east of Canton, was the 6,000 man division of one armed Major General William Wing Loring. Based in part on the the success of the skirmish at Bear Creek Bridge, “Old Joe” Johnston intended both Walker and Loring's divisions to spear head a drive across the Big Black River to Bear Creek and beyond, to Grant's supply base on Chickasaw Bayou below Snyder's Bluff.
To support that 2 division thrust, General Johnston had stationed Major General John Cabel Breckenridge's 6,000 man division some 20 miles south of Vernon and 10 miles due west of Canton, defending the little railroad town of Bolton. The Southern rail line had been rendered useless for the past month. But the Big Black River Railroad Bridge was still standing, just 20 miles beyond Bolton – a single day's march.
In addition, the 6,000 man division of wealthy slave owner Major General Samuel Gibbs French occupied the trenches at Jackson, at the end of the hastily repaired Central Mississippi railroad. The line was dependable only as far south as Canton. Beyond that the lack of ballast for the rails and the patchwork bridge repairs cut speeds in half or more. And now most of the slave workers had been switched to repairing the bridge over the Pearl River. Should the army move forward, Johnston could use French's division to support either Breckenridge or the thrust over the Big Black.
Finally, on Sunday, 28 June, General Johnston (above) gave the order, and the next morning, Monday, 29 June, his ramshackle Army of Relief, loaded with 3 days rations, lurched forward. Immediately problems showed Johnston's force had so exhausted itself in just getting to Jackson and Canton that it was still in no condition to take on Grant's Army of the Tennessee. On the first day General Walker's men managed to cover 6 miles, but they stumbled into camps on the Jones Plantation, still short of Birdsong Ferry.
And it was the inability of Breckenridge's men to move efficiently that drove the primadonna “Ole Blizzards” Loring (above) to throw yet another of his infamous hissy fits. His men were supposed to march this day from Canton to Bolton, then turn north, heading for Birdsong Ferry.
But they could not get through Bolton, which was jammed with Breckenridge's men still being issued their 3 days of rations. Flashing his sword and temper, Loring tried shoving individual units out of his way, which only made the situation worse . And then the now disjointed Breckenridge's regiments elbowed their way in between Loring's regiments.
Word of the tangled mess reached Breckenridge before noon. He ordered his forward units to hold at Edward's Depot, while he raced back to Bolton and faced down Loring in a shouting match. While all of that was going on, neither Loring's troops nor Breckenridge's troops moved very much at all. Eventually Johnston's staff officers intervened, and the mess slowly untangled. But Breckenridge's division got no farther than Edward's Depot, and Loring's division no further than Brownsville, Mississippi. And because those unit's did not reach their intended first day's objectives, General French's 6,000 men barely moved out of Jackson. All in all, the first day's march had been a minor disaster.
It seemed an indication that the numbers alone were not a fair measure of force provided by Johnston's Army of Relief. He had some 27,000 men, but most had been heavily used just getting to Jackson and Canton, and were now placing demands on the Confederate supply system it could no longer sustain. They were making the kind of rookie mistakes you would expect from "green" soldiers, not veterans. And when they finally reached the Big Black River Johnston's men discovered that the country to the west, which had been almost empty of Yankees in Mid-June, was far from that by the First of July.
Initially the only Yankees guarding Chickasaw Bayou were cavalry screens and Major General Parke's IX Corps, including 2 brigades in Major General Thomas Welsh's 1st Division, and 3 weak brigades of Brigadier General Robert B. Potters' 2nd Division. As May turned to June these men were pushed forward, until their trenches reached from the Yazoo River to Messanger Ford and Bush's Ferry, north of Birdsong Ferry.
By mid-June those troops, now named the Army of Observation, had been placed under the command of Major General William Tecumseh Sherman (above), and reinforced with 1 division each from each of the armies other corps - "Parke's two divisions from Haines's Bluff out to the Benton or ridge road; Tuttle's division, of my corps, joining on and extending to a plantation called Young's, overlooking Bear Creek valley, which empties into the Big Black above Messinger's Ferry; then McArthur's division, of McPherson's corps, took up the line, and reached to Osterhaus's division of McClernand's corps, which held a strong fortified position at the railroad-crossing of the Big Black River. "
As the threat of a Vicksburg breakout faded, more divisions from the besieging army were fed into Sherman's command. By the end of the month three divisions of the XVI corps, under 43 year old Minneapolis flour mill owner Major General Cadwallader Colden Washburn provided a substantial reserve. Sherman now had a total of nearly 40,000 men.
Johnston's Army of Relief could still muster only 27,000, and although the rebels were eager enough, they lacked the military stamina and equipment of the Yankee force.
After the war, Grant confided to journalist John Russell Young, that, “If I had known Johnston was coming (west of the Big Black), I would have told Pemberton to wait in Vicksburg until I wanted him, awaited Johnston’s advance, and given him battle. He could never have beaten that Vicksburg army, and thus I would have destroyed two armies perhaps.” Still Grant insisted, “...the South, in my opinion, had no better soldier than Joe Johnston – none at least that gave me more trouble.” And that included Robert E. Lee.
Johnston spent three days looking for an opening somewhere in Sherman's lines. He was cautious of being caught over the Big Black without a secure line of retreat, as Pemberton had been caught over Baker's Creek at Champion Hill. Finally, on the evening of 3 July, General Johnston decided he must act the next day, to relieve the pressure on Vicksburg's defenders. But that night, he received information which changed his mind.
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