VICKSBURG Chapter Forty - Seven

 

Late on the evening of Thursday, 14 May, 1863, General Joe Johnston (above) paused 6 miles north of Jackson, Mississippi, along the New Orleans and Memphis rail line. There he composed another missive – to call it an order stretches that definition to the breaking point - to Lieutenant General Pemberton, somewhere near Bovina Station. He wondered if Pemberton might be able to cut Grant's supply line. And he urged, again, that if Pemberton's units could not do that, then their forces should unite. And that was the passive aggressive "order" he sent to Pemberton, near midnight on Friday, 15, May.

Later that morning another 4,000 man brigade joined his forces, bringing Johnston's strength to about 10,000 men. But the new arrivals were exhausted, and needed at least a day to recover.  Within a week Johnston would have perhaps 30,000 men. But ominously, forty miles to the west on that morning, Lieutenant General Pemberton and his army was moving not toward a junction, as Johnston had urged and ordered earlier, but were still waiting.

Pemberton's original plan had been a compromise between his conflicting orders from Confederate President Jefferson Davis to hold Vicksburg (above), and his “orders” from Joe Johnston, to abandon the city and march his army east to Jackson. Pemberton's compromise to this conflict was the worst of both worlds. 

Pemberton left 2 divisions of infantry and the battalion of artillery – about 13,000 men in total – to hold Vicksburg and the heights above the Yazoo River. With his remaining 3 divisions of infantry and Wade Adam's Cavalry -about 17,000 men in total - he advanced eastward along the Southern Railroad to Edward's Depot (above). By staying along the railroad he was protecting his own supply line back to Vicksburg, and, he could argue, thus Vicksburg as well.

However last night, at a council of war, Pemberton had accepted Major General Loring's suggestion, that the army should strike toward Raymond – 20 miles to the southeast. The goal was to cut Grant's supply line, and allow Johnston's smaller force to safely advance and link up with Pemberton.  But, leaving the railroad required finding more horses and wagons.

It took time to seize the transport – until now Pemberton had refused to simply take what he needed – and to load the wagons and organize them into a column. And so Pemberton's entire army spent the morning on their asses while this wagon train was created. The rebel army was not ready to move until the morning was almost gone. And then, before the great advance had made much more than a single mile, it was forced to halt again.

You see, there were three routes which could be taken from Edward's Depot to Raymond. The most direct route crossed Baker's Creek (above, blue line) on a bridge and then turned toward Raymond.  Or, the army might first march east on the Bolton Road, where eventually a road net would allow the troops to turn south/east. The central route followed The Jackson road, climbing a 75 foot tall hill. On its broad flat top the Jackson road crossed a narrow north/south lane called the Ratcliff Road, before descending to level ground where it passed the farmhouse of Sid and Matilda Champion, who had given their name to the entire hill.

The hill top farm had been a wedding gift from the father of the bride, and in the 7 years since their nuptials, Sid and Matilda  (above) had built a 2 story home, and introduced 4 children into the world. Sid had joined the 28^th Mississippi cavalry in '62. And a year later, with soldiers from both sides gathering around her home, Matilda escaped with her children to her father's home in Madison County, Mississippi. The property was left to be guarded by the slaves who toiled the soil against their will. 

After crossing the small Jackson Creek, this central route, headed toward Clinton and beyond to the state capital of Jackson. But before doing that it also crossed another road which turned south toward Raymond.

General Pemberton had chosen the most direct route. But this proved to be a most unfortunate choice, because, as the head of Pemberton's column approached Baker's Creek ford the rebels found the stream swollen with Friday's downpour. The flood had washed out the bridge. 

A little scouting would have warned Pemberton of this problem But no one had checked the route in daylight, even with the hours of delay in getting started....

...not even though the vanguard of this sad sack march was being led by the man who had suggested it - the one armed General Loring (above).   So now, Pemberton's little army had to turn about and slowly counter march a mile back to Edward's Depot.  It took another hour or more. The inability to execute a simple march sapped the energy and spirit of the troops. But the man most offended was Major General Loring., and guess who old Give 'Em Blizzards" blamed for this screwup; not himself certainly, but his boss, General Pemberton.

Then Pemberton made things even worse by deciding to take the Jackson Road. After climbing Champion Hill, Pemberton, now  decided to leave the Jackson Road and follow the narrow and badly maintained “Ratcliff Plantation Road”, which ran a mile south across the top of Champion's Hill before dropping and reconnecting with the road he had originally intended upon using. This final choice slowed their progress even more, and the effect of all this waiting, marching and counter-marching was exemplified by Private Wesley Connor, a member of the Cherokee Artillery near the rear of the column. His unit had set out promptly at 7:00am, and then “... marched two hundred yards, halted an hour or two, and then marched back...” They had then then waited another 11 hours, until 6:00pm,  when they “...marched eastward several miles and then southward", before they, "...bivouacked five or six miles..." from their starting point.

Lorings men pitched their tents around the widow Champion's house, while Lieutenant General Pemberton slept comfortably inside. Two miles up the road, centered around the junction of the Raymond and Ratcliff roads was the division of Major General Bowen. And behind them, the troops commanded by Major General Stevenson,  camped along the northern crest of the hill.  And behind them was the supply train, which had delayed the army for half a day, and then advanced less than four miles.  It seemed to the participants as a disastrous day's march. In fact, the wreckage of Pemberton's first bold decision would save his army, because it failed.

Awakening before 5:00 the next morning, Saturday, 16 May, 1863, Pemberton learned that the cavalry scouts sent ahead to locate Grant's supply trains had found the roads between Port Gibson and Raymond, completely empty. Suddenly Pemberton was adrift. Where were Grant's supply trains? Where was Grant's army? Then about 6:30 the commander of his cavalry brigade, Colonel Wirt Adams (above) came galloping up to report that his men were already skirmishing with Yankee infantry on the Bolton Road, at the very rear of Pemberton's army.  And behind those skirmishers there appeared to be a lot of Yankee soldiers on the road to Edward's Depot, in the perfect position to cut Pemberton's men off from their supply line back to Vicksburg.

Almost immediately a new rider appeared, bearing a message from General Johnston, dated the afternoon of Thursday, 14 May. It informed Pemberton that Johnston was surrendering Jackson, and added, this “,,,makes your plan (to attack Grant's supply line) impractical. The only mode by which we can unite is by your moving directly to Clinton...".

But the problem with that suggestion was that the road to Clinton was filled with Yankee soldiers heading right at the rear of Pemberton's disjointed army. 

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