VICKSBURG Chapter Eighty - Nine

 

A woman of Vicksburg awoke in her cave on Saturday morning, 4 July, 1863 to an unusual sound. Silence. Returning to her home, later that morning, in her kitchen,  she met a soldier looking for scraps. He told her that “...the men in Vicksburg will never forgive Pemberton...A child would have known better than to shut men up in this cursed trap to starve to death...Haven’t I seen my friends carted out three or four in a box, that had died of starvation... because we had a fool for a general.”

At about 10 a.m., white flags began to appear along the rebel fortifications. Painfully thin Confederate regiments (above)  " “staggered like drunken men from emaciation, and...wept like children..." and formed pale skinned ranks on the ridge line. They stacked their rifles, handguns, shotguns, swords and bayonets and furled their battle flags. Then they glumly waited.

John Benjamin Sanborn (above) was a 36 year old widowed lawyer from St. Paul, Minnesota, who had fought in every major engagement of the campaign since the Battle of Port Gibson.  Now a full bird Colonel, he and his old regiment, the 4^th Minnesota infantry, were General Logan's choice to lead the 3^rd division into Vicksburg. The evening before Sanborn's brigade had been issued new uniforms. The soldiers had shined the brass on their muskets and buttons until it shown like new as they formed up along the Jackson Road behind their band.

With General Grant and his staff in the lead, followed by General John Alexander Logan and his 3^rd division staff, the Yankees marched through the remnants of the Louisiana redoubt and down into the heart of Vicksburg. The 3^rd division band was playing “Hail Columbia”, the defacto national anthem since 1800, as well as “The Star Spangled Banner”, which would not be the official anthem until 1931.

Carried in an ambulance at the head of the 45^th Illinois, second regiment in the column, was the wounded Colonel Jasper Adalmorn Maltby. His head bandages still seeped blood from the 22 June battle in the crater of the Louisiana redan,  but the 36 year old gunsmith from Galena was determined to celebrate with his regiment, both crippled in the victory. He would shortly be promoted to Brigadier General, but would struggle to recover from his injuries.

As the column passed into the city itself, the victorious Yankee cannon outside slowly fired a 31 gun salute – one shot for each state in the union, including those in rebellion. By limiting the salute in this way, Grant disguised the number of cannon already moved to Sherman's front 20 miles to the east, which was now preparing to advance against Joe Johnston's Army of Relief. At the junction with Cherry Street the regiment reached the Warren County Courthouse (above) , where they formed around the base of the building. 

In front of the east portico, Grant dismounted and (above) was greeted by his defeated foe - Lieutenant General Pemberton. This set the Yankee soldiers to cheering.

A resident of the United States for just 5 years, Norwegian born 22 year old Private Knud Helling, wrote his best friend, “ We marched into the city in good order with (band) playing and the flags flying...The Rebel soldiers and the inhabitants stood in groups on the street corners and stared at us while we passed them...The inhabitants....looked very pale and wretched...The city is somewhat damaged by the horrible bombardment, and many of the houses have marks from our cannon balls....” John Thurston, also with the 4^th Minnesota, recalled it as “...the most glorious 4^th of July I ever spent.”

The cheering, happy blue coats drove the weary Confederates to evacuate the court house. With them gone, Yankee staff officers clambered up the iron staircase to the cupola, for an unimpeded view of their victory. One of them, who had imbibed of spirits, noticed the staircase had been forged in Cincinnati, and promptly cursed “...the impudence of the people who thought they could whip the United States when they couldn't even make their own staircases.”

Confederate Captain John Henry Jones was so reduced by hunger that he approached a Union lieutenant and requested permission to buy food. The lieutenant responded that request had to go through military channels, to which Jones replied it must be obvious from his appearance, “I would be dead some days before its return”.  

Laughing at the shared frustration with military bureaucracy, the Yankee remembered he had some “trash” in his haversack. The 32 year old Jones wrote that, “The “trash” consisted of "...about two pounds of gingersnaps and butter crackers; luxuries I had not seen for three years. I was struck dumb with amazement....I fell upon that “trash” like a hungry wolf....the memory of that sumptuous feast still lingers, and my heart yet warms with gratitude towards that good officer for the blessing he bestowed.”

Viewing from her nearby home, Dora Miller with her husband watched the American flag unfurled atop the Warren County Courthouse. They shared northern sympathies and he . “...drew a long breath of contentment. Dora herself wrote, “Now I feel once more at home in mine own country.” In an hour more a grand rush of civilians set out for the river. With the riverfront batteries silent, the Federal fleet of transports now swarmed to the empty docks (above), carrying “coffee and flour.” First come, first served,’ you know,” the couple were told. Within hours crowds were dashing “...through the streets with their arms full, canned goods predominating.”

Grant wrote in his memoirs, “Our soldiers were no sooner inside the lines than the two armies began to fraternize...I myself saw our men taking bread from their haversacks and giving it to the enemy they had so recently been engaged in starving out. It was accepted with avidity and with thanks.” Not every southerner was willing to be gracious. Margaret Lord, wife of the Reverend Lord and mother to Lida, turned down a Yankee offer of food.

From the docks, Grant dispatched a staff officer to Cairo, the nearest secure telegraph station, with the following message for Washington: “The enemy surrendered this morning. The only terms allowed is their parole as prisoners of war. This I regard as a great advantage to us at this moment. It saves, probably, several days in the capture, and leaves (our) troops and transports ready for immediate service...

"....Sherman, with a large force, moves immediately on Johnston, to drive him from the State. I will send troops to the relief of Banks, and return the 9th army corps to Burnside.” The dispatch boat arrived in Cairo about noon on Tuesday, 7 July, 1863. And then the entire world knew.

Grant meanwhile returned to his headquarters, where he ordered all but a few units to prepare to join the march on the Big Black River.   About 5:00 that evening, Logan's men began to spread out into the town. Noted the woman of Vicksburg, “What a contrast to the suffering creatures we had seen so long were these stalwart, well-fed men...Sleek horses, polished arms, bright plumes, - this was the pride and panoply of war. Civilization, discipline, and order seemed to enter with the measured tramp of those marching columns; and the heart turned with throbs of added pity to the worn men in gray, who were being blindly dashed against this embodiment of modern power. And now this “silence that is golden...” 

It would be a another week before the 31,000 rebel soldiers, including sick and wounded, would receive their parole papers, and set out for their homes or other bases to await exchange. The Confederates also surrendered 50 smooth bore field cannons, 31 rifled field guns, 22 howitzers, 46 smooth bore siege guns, 21 rifled siege guns, 1 siege howitzer, and a 10-inch mortar - 172 artillery pieces in total. 

The Yankees also removed from Confederate control 38,000 artillery shells, 58,000 pounds of black powder, 4,800 artillery cartridges and 60,000 muskets.

Editor John Shannon had dismissed a Yankee boast that one day Grant would eat dinner in Vicksburg, by advising the recipe for cooking rabbit was “First, Ketch your rabbit”. The honorable Mr. Shannon now admitted in the last edition of his publication, printed on the back of wallpaper, that Grant had indeed caught his rabbit.

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VICKSBURG Chapter Forty - Six

 

Beginning bright and early on the morning of Friday, 15 May, 1863, the 16, 000 men of William Tecumseh Sherman's XVth Corp began destroying everything in Jackson, Mississippi which contributed to the military power of the Confederacy. 

This included, Sherman explained , burning “ the arsenal buildings, the Government foundry, the gun carriage establishment, including the carriages for two complete six-gun batteries”. Also a horse stable was burned down – not the horses, they were too valuable - dozens of captured wagons, with saddles, bridles and traces were also destroyed, as were the carpenter and paint shops. Seventeen cannon, captured in taking the city, were spiked, and then packed with powder and then set off, blowing out their breeches.

But the Yankees spent most of their energy, and seemed to most enjoy, dismantling the railroads. This meant tearing the iron rails from their cross ties.

Piling the ties four or five feet high , the soldiers then setting them on fire - which was easily done as they were soaked in lubricating oil constantly dripping from the locomotives. 

Once the ties were burning fiercely, the iron rails were piled on top and heated until they softened. These were then bent around an unlucky tree or post and twisted into what would later be nicknamed “Sherman's Neckties”.  If done right, such neckties would have be returned to a foundry, to be recast.

According to Sherman this treatment was applied to the rail lines crossing in the city for a distance of “4 miles east of Jackson, 3 south, 3 north, and 10 west.” 

In addition the Yankees burned the bridge over the Pearl River along with 3,000 feet of high trestle work connecting it to level ground. They also burned every other bridge they could reach. Sherman estimated the cost of rebuilding the rail lines alone would be $204,000.00 – over $4 million today.

The rail yards machine shops were dismantled and burned, all the machines for making machinery were pounded with sledge hammers until they were useless. Five locomotives were blown apart, and 22 freight cars were burned. Sherman estimated it would take six months to repair and replace all that was destroyed. But he was being conservative. Jackson was finished as railroad transfer center, as the confederacy lacked the material to replace any of it.

The Yankees also destroyed the state prison, known as “The Walls” (above). Since it's opening in 1840, Mississippi had used the labor of the 200 inmates to defray costs for their incarceration, even adding a 40 acre farm. But during the war most of the prisoners had either been shipped to adjoining states, or inducted into the Confederate Army. After the 1862 arsenal explosion, the prison factories had been used for making ammunition, as well continuing the manufacture of hemp rope, and bags for cotton harvesting. But Sherman's men now cleared that building and blew down its walls.

Not far from the state capital building, atop 'asylum heights', was the 7 year old state mental hospital (above). It had once sheltered 150 white patients, but war and 'natural' mortality had reduced that number by half.  However, Yankees under Brigadier General Joseph (Fighting Joe) Anthony Mower – in charge of the destructions in the center of Jackson - went on a shopping spree of the hospital's storehouse and garden, harvesting the crops and driving away many of the animals intended to feed the patients. 

Even worse, according to the Jackson Daily News, “...seven of the institution’s ten employees left their jobs and joined the Union Army.”  In other words, they had been slaves. It seems even the care of the most vulnerable in Mississippi had been done by the cheapest labor available. The remaining 50 or so patients survived as best they could, if they could, until the end of the war.

Since 1841 the Federal Government had been sitting on a fund to pay for the establishment of a state school for the blind. But the state of Mississippi refused to recognize the Federal right to seize and sell those lands, and for 13 years had refused to avail themselves of the money. Finally, in 1857, sanity demanded that the children came first and and in 1858 a dormitory and rude campus were constructed (above) a mile and a half west on the Clinton Road. Federal troops now investigated the property, but did little damage. However, the support staff were slaves and most chose personal freedom over caring for other people's children.   Meanwhile, the mostly young, indigent white patients were now just another cost of defending human slavery at all costs.

No Government buildings were purposely damaged – the state capital building (above) still stands a century later. The City Hall, the Masonic Hall, the Concert Hall and The Lyceum were all guarded by Federal troops to ensure their survival,  Even the Governor's mansion remained untouched. However a few Yankees had discovered a cache of rum and some pillaging of private property resulted. A minister admitted that while his church was undamaged, his home had suffered, “... wanton destruction...May God forgive them for all the evil they did...” But the war was still young, and compared to what Sherman would unleash upon Jackson just 5 months later, this was a benign occupation. 

In truth, Sherman had very little time to do much more. Before nightfall, “Cump” (above) had received orders that the last of his men were to be on the road to Clinton, by 10:00am, Saturday, 16 May, 1863. The Vicksburg campaign was rushing toward it's climax.

And Grant was ready. As the tail end of Sherman's Corps, General Blair 's division reached Raymond on 14 May, There they passed on the 200 wagon ammunition train to the protection of McClernand's Corps.  Most of what the army needed to eat and move was being taken from the Mississippi farmers and plantations. But shot and shell, sugar and coffee were all in short supply in the Confederacy. Those, the Army of the Tennessee  had brought with them from Grand Gulf, not in a continuous train of wagons, but in concentrated bundles, each protected by a full division. But this was to be the final bundle for Grant's army. After this train there would be no string of vulnerable wagons filling the roads between Grand Gulf and Jackson, Mississippi.

The vulnerable rear of the Federal army, which General Loring had convinced Pemberton to strike for, no longer existed. Had Pemberton struck on 12 May, or even 13 May, he might have hit Grant a serious blow. But by 15 May, it was too late. And had Pemberton followed Johnston's original order, he might have been striking toward Clinton on 15 May with 35,000 men, and the story of  Vicksburg might have been very different.

The story that was told later that a year and a half earlier an unnamed rebel civilian was suspected of union sympathies by authorities in the still Confederate city of Nashville, Tennessee (above). This rebel was then publicly accused and escorted out of the town in shame just before that city became the first rebel state capital to fall to Federals in February of 1862. 

That individual, now in Jackson, Mississippi, harbored his resentment until 13 May, 1863, when Captain James Yeager went looking for two volunteers to carry copies of General Joseph Johnston's orders through the Yankee armies to General Pemberton, in Bovina.  Knowing the vital nature of the message, the insulted rebel, volunteered. And at the first Yankee picket outside of Clinton,  he – or she – repaid the insult by handing over their copy of Johnston's message to Pemberton. Or so the story goes.

We know as fact the captured message, however it was acquired, went directly to the headquarters of Major General James Birdseye McPherson (above), who passed the message on to General Grant's headquarters in the evening hours of 14 May. 

Even with parts of the order written in an as yet unbroken code, the essence was clear. Pemberton (above) was ordered to abandon Vicksburg, and march on Clinton, where he would be met by Johnston's gathering host. Johnston may have been pushed out of the game, but Grant now knew a rebel army was bearing down on his rear.

This explained Grant's orders to  McPherson on the evening of Thursday, 14 May. His XVII Corps wheeled about on their heels and during 15 May marched back through Clinton, to Bolton - 20 miles west of Jackson.  Also on that Friday, the  Major General John Alexander McClernand was ordered to "Turn all your forces toward Bolton Station, and make all dispatch in getting there. Move troops by the most direct road from wherever they may be on the receipt of this order." Grant was determined to block all of the roads Pemberton might use to combine with Johnston's growing force -  the Bridgeport to Clinton Road, the Edward's Depot to Clinton Road which ran through Bolton, and the Bolton to Raymond road.   Sherman's 2 available divisions were  ordered to finish their work in Jackson and be on the Clinton road by 10:00am on Saturday, 16 May.

Grant's staff had just shifted the direction of march of the Army of The Tennessee 180 degrees. McClernand's and McPherson's Corps were now in the lead.  Sherman's Corps was now the reserve.  It was a classic Napoleonic use of independent Corps to quickly concentrate their power in whatever direction their general chose.  Grant could not know that Pemberton's decision to strike toward Raymond was, in effect, moving toward Grant's left flank, while uncovering Grant's most direct route to Vicksburg and a re-establishment of the Federal supply line.   And neither side could know the outcome of the entire campaign would now be determined not by human egos or minds, but by the rains of 14 May.

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VICKSBURG Chapter Eighty-Seven

 

A woman of Vicksburg awoke in her cave on Saturday morning, 4 July, 1863 to an unusual sound. Silence. Returning to her home, later that morning, in her kitchen,  she met a soldier looking for scraps. He told her that “...the men in Vicksburg will never forgive Pemberton...A child would have known better than to shut men up in this cursed trap to starve to death...Haven’t I seen my friends carted out three or four in a box, that had died of starvation... because we had a fool for a general.”

At about 10 a.m., white flags began to appear along the rebel fortifications. Painfully thin Confederate regiments (above)  " “staggered like drunken men from emaciation, and...wept like children..." and formed pale skinned ranks on the ridge line. They stacked their rifles, handguns, shotguns, swords and bayonets and furled their battle flags. Then they glumly waited.

John Benjamin Sanborn (above) was a 36 year old widowed lawyer from St. Paul, Minnesota, who had fought in every major engagement of the campaign since the Battle of Port Gibson.  Now a full bird Colonel, he and his old regiment, the 4^th Minnesota infantry, were General Logan's choice to lead the 3^rd division into Vicksburg. The evening before Sanborn's brigade had been issued new uniforms. The soldiers had shined the brass on their muskets and buttons until it shown like new as they formed up along the Jackson Road behind their band.

With General Grant and his staff in the lead, followed by General John Alexander Logan and his 3^rd division staff, the Yankees marched through the remnants of the Louisiana redoubt and down into the heart of Vicksburg. The 3^rd division band was playing “Hail Columbia”, the defacto national anthem since 1800, as well as “The Star Spangled Banner”, which would not be the official anthem until 1931.

Carried in an ambulance at the head of the 45^th Illinois, second regiment in the column, was the wounded Colonel Jasper Adalmorn Maltby. His head bandages still seeped blood from the 22 June battle in the crater of the Louisiana redan,  but the 36 year old gunsmith from Galena was determined to celebrate with his regiment, both crippled in the victory. He would shortly be promoted to Brigadier General, but would struggle to recover from his injuries.

As the column passed into the city itself, the victorious Yankee cannon outside slowly fired a 31 gun salute – one shot for each state in the union, including those in rebellion. By limiting the salute in this way, Grant disguised the number of cannon already moved to Sherman's front 20 miles to the east, which was now preparing to advance against Joe Johnston's Army of Relief. At the junction with Cherry Street the regiment reached the Warren County Courthouse (above) , where they formed around the base of the building. 

In front of the east portico, Grant dismounted and (above) was greeted by his defeated foe - Lieutenant General Pemberton. This set the Yankee soldiers to cheering.

A resident of the United States for just 5 years, Norwegian born 22 year old Private Knud Helling, wrote his best friend, “ We marched into the city in good order with (band) playing and the flags flying...The Rebel soldiers and the inhabitants stood in groups on the street corners and stared at us while we passed them...The inhabitants....looked very pale and wretched...The city is somewhat damaged by the horrible bombardment, and many of the houses have marks from our cannon balls....” John Thurston, also with the 4^th Minnesota, recalled it as “...the most glorious 4^th of July I ever spent.”

The cheering, happy blue coats drove the weary Confederates to evacuate the court house. With them gone, Yankee staff officers clambered up the iron staircase to the cupola, for an unimpeded view of their victory. One of them, who had imbibed of spirits, noticed the staircase had been forged in Cincinnati, and promptly cursed “...the impudence of the people who thought they could whip the United States when they couldn't even make their own staircases.”

Confederate Captain John Henry Jones was so reduced by hunger that he approached a Union lieutenant and requested permission to buy food. The lieutenant responded that request had to go through military channels, to which Jones replied it must be obvious from his appearance, “I would be dead some days before its return”.  

Laughing at the shared frustration with military bureaucracy, the Yankee remembered he had some “trash” in his haversack. The 32 year old Jones wrote that, “The “trash” consisted of "...about two pounds of gingersnaps and butter crackers; luxuries I had not seen for three years. I was struck dumb with amazement....I fell upon that “trash” like a hungry wolf....the memory of that sumptuous feast still lingers, and my heart yet warms with gratitude towards that good officer for the blessing he bestowed.”

Viewing from her nearby home, Dora Miller with her husband watched the American flag unfurled atop the Warren County Courthouse. They shared northern sympathies and he . “...drew a long breath of contentment. Dora herself wrote, “Now I feel once more at home in mine own country.” In an hour more a grand rush of civilians set out for the river. With the riverfront batteries silent, the Federal fleet of transports now swarmed to the empty docks (above), carrying “coffee and flour.” First come, first served,’ you know,” the couple were told. Within hours crowds were dashing “...through the streets with their arms full, canned goods predominating.”

Grant wrote in his memoirs, “Our soldiers were no sooner inside the lines than the two armies began to fraternize...I myself saw our men taking bread from their haversacks and giving it to the enemy they had so recently been engaged in starving out. It was accepted with avidity and with thanks.” Not every southerner was willing to be gracious. Margaret Lord, wife of the Reverend Lord and mother to Lida, turned down a Yankee offer of food.

From the docks, Grant dispatched a staff officer to Cairo, the nearest secure telegraph station, with the following message for Washington: “The enemy surrendered this morning. The only terms allowed is their parole as prisoners of war. This I regard as a great advantage to us at this moment. It saves, probably, several days in the capture, and leaves (our) troops and transports ready for immediate service...

"....Sherman, with a large force, moves immediately on Johnston, to drive him from the State. I will send troops to the relief of Banks, and return the 9th army corps to Burnside.” The dispatch boat arrived in Cairo about noon on Tuesday, 7 July, 1863. And then the entire world knew.

Grant meanwhile returned to his headquarters, where he ordered all but a few units to prepare to join the march on the Big Black River.   About 5:00 that evening, Logan's men began to spread out into the town. Noted the woman of Vicksburg, “What a contrast to the suffering creatures we had seen so long were these stalwart, well-fed men...Sleek horses, polished arms, bright plumes, - this was the pride and panoply of war. Civilization, discipline, and order seemed to enter with the measured tramp of those marching columns; and the heart turned with throbs of added pity to the worn men in gray, who were being blindly dashed against this embodiment of modern power. And now this “silence that is golden...” 

It would be a another week before the 31,000 rebel soldiers, including sick and wounded, would receive their parole papers, and set out for their homes or other bases to await exchange. The Confederates also surrendered 50 smooth bore field cannons, 31 rifled field guns, 22 howitzers, 46 smooth bore siege guns, 21 rifled siege guns, 1 siege howitzer, and a 10-inch mortar - 172 artillery pieces in total. 

The Yankees also removed from Confederate control 38,000 artillery shells, 58,000 pounds of black powder, 4,800 artillery cartridges and 60,000 muskets.

Editor John Shannon had dismissed a Yankee boast that one day Grant would eat dinner in Vicksburg, by advising the recipe for cooking rabbit was “First, Ketch your rabbit”. The honorable Mr. Shannon now admitted in the last edition of his publication, printed on the back of wallpaper, that Grant had indeed caught his rabbit.

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