: From Fort Henry to Corinth by Force M F Manning Ferguson - United States History Civil War 1861-1865 Campaigns US Civil War

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ing into Oak Creek; the camp was pitched between the Purdy road and the bluff-banks of Oak Creek. The Third Brigade, commanded by Colonel Hildebrand, was posted to the left of Shiloh Church, its right being near the church. Precision in camping was not exacted, and the left regiment of Colonel Hildebrand's Brigade, the Fifty-third Ohio, in order to enclose a fine spring of water within the brigade, pitched its camp about two hundred yards to the left and front of its next regiment , and was separated from the rest of the brigade by this distance and by a stream with swampy borders which emptied into Oak Creek. General Sherman's headquarters were to the rear of Shiloh Church. His batteries, Taylor's and Waterhouse's, together with his cavalry, were camped in rear of the infantry.

General Grant arrived at Savannah on the 17th and assumed command, reported to General Halleck, and on the same day ordered General C.F. Smith's division to Pittsburg Landing. His division, the Second, encamped, not in a line, but in convenient localities on the plateau between Brier Creek and the river. McClernand with the First Division was sent a few days later, and selecting the most level ground, laid out the most regular camp. His front crossed the Corinth road about two-thirds of a mile in rear of Shiloh Church, the road intersecting his line near his left flank; the direction of his line was to the northwest, reaching toward the bluffs of the valley of Snake Creek. General Prentiss reported to General Grant for assignment to duty, and about March 25th, six new regiments, not yet assigned, reported to him and were by him put into two brigades constituting the Sixth Division. These brigades were subsequently increased by regiments assigned to him as late as April 5th and 6th. The Fifth Ohio Battery, Captain Hickenlooper, arriving on April 5th, was assigned to the Sixth Division, and went into camp. Prentiss' camp faced to the south. It is not easy now to identify precisely its position. It appears incidentally, from reports of the battle of April 6th, that a ravine ran along the rear of the right of the division camp, and another ravine in front of the left. The left regiment of the right brigade lay on the lower or most southern branch of the Corinth road; the left flank of the division was in sight of Stuart's brigade; there was a considerable gap between its right flank and Sherman's division. The divisions were not camped with a view to defence against an apprehended attack; but they did fulfil General Halleck's instructions to General C.F. Smith, to select a depot with a view to the march on to Corinth. Sherman's division lay across one road to Corinth, with McClernand's in its rear; Prentiss' division lay across the other road to Corinth, with Hurlbut in his rear, and C.F. Smith was camped so as to follow either. The divisions did not march to the selected ground and pitch camp in a forenoon; but, partly from the rain and mud, partly want of practice, some of the divisions were several days unloading from the boats, hauling in the great trains then allowed to regiments laying out the ground, and putting up tents. General Sherman, before settling down in his camp, made a reconnoissance out to Monterey, nearly half way to Corinth, and dislodged a detachment of hostile cavalry camped there. Every division and many of the brigades found a separate drill-ground in some neighboring field, and constant drilling was preparing the command for the march to Corinth.

Major-General C.F. Smith received an injury to his leg by jumping into a yawl early in March. This injury, seeming trivial at first, resulted in his death on April 25th. It became so aggravated by the end of March that he was obliged to move from Pittsburg Landing to Savannah, leaving Brigadier-General W.H.L. Wallace in command of his division, and Major-General McClernand, senior officer present, at Pittsburg. General Grant--who went up from Savannah every day to visit the camps, and was requested by General McClernand, by letter on March 27th, to move his headquarters to Pittsburg Landing--was about to transfer his headquarters thither on April 4th, when he received a letter from General Buell saying he would arrive next day at Savannah, and requesting an interview. The transfer of headquarters was accordingly postponed till after the interview.

General L. Wallace's division disembarked at Crump's Landing on the same side of the river with Pittsburg Landing, and a little above Savannah. His First Brigade went into camp near the river; the Second at Stony Lonesome, about two miles out on the road to Purdy; the Third Brigade immediately beyond Adamsville, on the same road. The Third Brigade went into camp on the inner slope of a sharp ridge, and cut down the timber on the exterior slope, to aid the holding of the position in case of an attack in front.

While Grant's army was sailing up the river and getting settled at Pittsburg, General Buell with five divisions of his army was marching from Nashville to Savannah. Immediately on receiving General Halleck's order to march, he sent out his cavalry to secure the bridges on his route, in which they succeeded, except in the cases of the important bridge over Duck Creek at Columbia, and an unimportant bridge a few miles north of that. On the 15th, the Fourth Division, commanded by Brigadier-General A. McD. McCook, moved out, and at intervals, up to March 20th, it was followed in order by the Fifth, Brigadier-General T.L. Crittenden, Sixth, Brigadier-General T.J. Wood, and First, Brigadier-General George H. Thomas--37,000 men in all. Having no pontoons, General Buell built a bridge over Duck Creek. This would have caused little delay later in the war; but to fresh troops, who yet had to learn the business of military service, it was a formidable task, and was not completed till the 29th. While waiting for the completion of the bridge, General Buell's command learned that General Grant's army was on the west bank of the Tennessee. General Nelson at once asked permission to ford the stream and push rapidly on to Savannah. Permission being obtained, the division, with Ammen's brigade--the Twenty-fourth Ohio, Sixth Ohio, and Thirty-sixth Indiana in front--began their march early on the morning of the 29th, the men stripped of their pantaloons, carrying their cartridge-boxes on their necks; the ammunition-boxes of the artillery taken from the limbers and carried over on scows, and tents packed in the bottom of the wagon-beds, to lift ammunition and stores above water.

The bridge was finished and the march resumed the same day. Nelson having secured the advance, his eagerness gave an impetus to the entire column. The divisions were ordered to camp at night six miles apart, making a column thirty miles long. But this prevented the clogging of the march on the wet and soft roads, the alternate crowding up and lengthening out of the column, the weary waiting of the crowded rear for the obstructed front to move, nights spent on the road, and late bivouacs reached toward morning. It made Buell's advance slow, but it prevented the new troops from being worn out, and brought them in good condition onto the field. General Buell intended to take at Waynesboro the road to Hamburg Landing, instead of the direct road to Savannah, and put his army there into a separate camp. General Nelson, however, moving faster than was expected, drew the divisions behind him through Waynesboro, on the road to Savannah, before General Buell issued the order, and so unconsciously defeated the intention. Nelson's brigade reached Savannah during April 5th, Crittenden's division camped that night a few miles distant, and General Buell himself reached Savannah or its outskirts some time in the evening.

General A.S. Johnston was encamped with his army at Edgefield, opposite Nashville, on February 15th. A despatch from General Pillow that evening announced a great victory won by the garrison of Fort Donelson. Just before daybreak of the 16th another despatch was received, that Buckner would capitulate at daylight. Immediately staff and orderlies were aroused, and the troops put in motion across the river to Nashville. The morning papers were filled with the "victory, glorious and complete," and the city was ringing with joy. In the forenoon the news spread of the surrender of Donelson. The people were struck with dismay, the city was in panic, the populace was delirious with excitement. A wild mob surrounded Johnston's headquarters and demanded to know whether their generals intended to fight or not.

Johnston immediately began the abandonment of Nashville. First were sent off the fifteen hundred sick brought on from Bowling Green, together with the tenants of the hospitals at Nashville. The railway was then taxed to its utmost to carry away the stores of most value. It was evident that all the stores could not be taken away, and pillage of commissary stores and quartermaster stores by citizens was permitted. A regiment of infantry and a battalion of cavalry were put on guard and patrolled the streets to reduce the riotous to order. Johnston moved out with his command on February 18th, leaving Floyd and Forrest with a force in Nashville to preserve order, remove the public stores, and to destroy what could not be removed.

Popular excitement always demands a victim, and the outcry was almost universal that Johnston should be relieved from command. But, to a deputation that went to Jefferson Davis, President of the Confederacy, with this request, he replied: "I know Johnston well. If he is not a general, we had better give up the war, for we have no general." Johnston found the Tennessee, running from Alabama and Mississippi up to the Ohio, in the possession of the National fleets and armies. The force under his immediate command was therefore separated from the force under Beauregard that was guarding the Mississippi. Unless they should join, they would be beaten in detail. To join involved the surrender either of Central Tennessee or of the Mississippi. Johnston resolved to give up Central Tennessee until he could regain it, and hold on to the Mississippi. But to hold the Mississippi required continued possession of the railroads, and such points especially as Corinth and Humboldt. Corinth, both from its essential importance and its exposure to attack by reason of its nearness to the river, was the point for concentration. Johnston moved from Nashville to Murfreesboro, not on the direct route to Corinth, to conceal his purpose. At Murfreesboro he added to the forces brought from Bowling Green between three and four thousand of the men who escaped from Donelson, and the command of General Crittenden from Kentucky, quickly raising his force at Murfreesboro to seventeen thousand men. Leaving Murfreesboro on February 28th, marching through Shelbyville to Decatur, he arrived at Corinth, on March 24th, with twenty thousand men. General Bragg, with ten thousand well-drilled troops from Pensacola, had preceded him. General Ruggles, with a brigade, came from New Orleans; Major-General Polk, with General Cheatham's division from Columbus, with the troops that escaped from Island No. Ten the night before escape was cut off, and various outlying garrisons under General Beauregard's command, swelled the concourse. Van Dorn, having failed to drive Curtis back into Missouri, was ordered to come with his command to Corinth. A regiment arrived before April 6th, the rest later. Detached commands guarding the line of the Memphis and Charleston Railroad were called in. The governors of States were called on and raised new levies. Beauregard made a personal appeal for volunteers, which brought in several regiments. Johnston had before called for reinforcements in vain. Now every nerve was strained to aid him. An inspection of his command satisfied him that if all the soldiers detailed as cooks and teamsters were relieved, he would have another brigade of effective men. He sent messengers through the surrounding country, urging citizens to hire their negroes as cooks and teamsters for ninety days, or even sixty days. But the messengers returned with the answer that the planters would freely give their last son, but they would not part with a negro or a mule.

General Bragg, on arriving at Corinth, wished to attack the troops as they were beginning to land at Pittsburg and Crump's landings. General Beauregard forbade this, writing to Bragg: "I would prefer the defensive-offensive--that is, to take up such a position as would compel the enemy to develop his intentions, and to attack us, before he could penetrate any distance from his base; then, when within striking distance of us, to take the offensive and crush him wherever we may happen to strike him, cutting him off, if possible, from his base of operations or the river."

On March 25th, Johnston completed the concentration of his troops. Van Dorn was in person in Corinth, and was ordered to bring forward his command. Johnston determined to wait as long as practicable for it. Meanwhile, to hasten the organization and preparation of his army, he appointed Gen. Bragg chief of staff for the time, but to resume command of his corps when the movement should begin. Of him, Colonel William Preston Johnston says, in his life of his father--a valuable book, prepared with great industry, and written with an evident desire to be fair: "In Bragg there was so much that was strong marred by most evident weakness, so many virtues blemished by excess or defect in temper and education, so near an approach to greatness and so manifest a failure to attain it, that his worst enemy ought to find something to admire in him, and his best friend something painful in the attempt to portray him truly." A thorough disciplinarian and a master of detail, his merits found full play, and his defects were less apparent in his position on the staff.

Johnston was organizing his army; Grant was assembling his twenty-three miles away. On the other side of the Tennessee, ninety miles from Savannah, Buell, halted by Duck Creek, was building a bridge for his troops--a bridge which it required twelve days to construct. Johnston having completed his concentration, it was his obvious policy to attack before Grant should be further reinforced. General Beauregard, in his letter of March 18th to Bragg, said: "While I have guarded you against an uncertain offensive, I am decidedly of the opinion that we should endeavor to entice the enemy into an engagement as soon as possible, and before he shall have further increased his numbers by the large numbers which he must still have in reserve and available--that is, beat him in detail." Lee wrote to Johnston, on March 26th: "I need not urge you, when your army is united, to deal a blow at the enemy in your front, if possible, before his rear gets up from Nashville. You have him divided, and keep him so, if you can." It was Johnston's purpose, and expressed, to attack Grant before Buell should arrive. But he determined to continue organizing and waiting for Van Dorn as long as that would be safe.

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