Personal Memoirs of U. S. Grant, Complete

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Almost the first complaints made to me were these two outrages. The
gentleman who made the complaints informed me first of his own high
standing as a lawyer, a citizen and a Christian. He was a deacon in the
church which had been defiled by the occupation of Union troops, and by
a Union chaplain filling the pulpit. He did not use the word "defile,"
but he expressed the idea very clearly. He asked that the church be
restored to the former congregation. I told him that no order had been
issued prohibiting the congregation attending the church. He said of
course the congregation could not hear a Northern clergyman who differed
so radically with them on questions of government. I told him the
troops would continue to occupy that church for the present, and that
they would not be called upon to hear disloyal sentiments proclaimed
from the pulpit. This closed the argument on the first point.

Then came the second. The complainant said that he wanted the papers
restored to him which had been surrendered to the provost-marshal under
protest; he was a lawyer, and before the establishment of the
"Confederate States Government" had been the attorney for a number of
large business houses at the North; that "his government" had
confiscated all debts due "alien enemies," and appointed commissioners,
or officers, to collect such debts and pay them over to the
"government": but in his case, owing to his high standing, he had been
permitted to hold these claims for collection, the responsible officials
knowing that he would account to the "government" for every dollar
received. He said that his "government," when it came in possession of
all its territory, would hold him personally responsible for the claims
he had surrendered to the provost-marshal. His impudence was so sublime
that I was rather amused than indignant. I told him, however, that if
he would remain in Memphis I did not believe the Confederate government
would ever molest him. He left, no doubt, as much amazed at my
assurance as I was at the brazenness of his request.

On the 11th of July General Halleck received telegraphic orders
appointing him to the command of all the armies, with headquarters in
Washington. His instructions pressed him to proceed to his new field of
duty with as little delay as was consistent with the safety and
interests of his previous command. I was next in rank, and he
telegraphed me the same day to report at department headquarters at
Corinth. I was not informed by the dispatch that my chief had been
ordered to a different field and did not know whether to move my
headquarters or not. I telegraphed asking if I was to take my staff
with me, and received word in reply: "This place will be your
headquarters. You can judge for yourself." I left Memphis for my new
field without delay, and reached Corinth on the 15th of the month.
General Halleck remained until the 17th of July; but he was very
uncommunicative, and gave me no information as to what I had been called
to Corinth for.

When General Halleck left to assume the duties of general-in-chief I
remained in command of the district of West Tennessee. Practically I
became a department commander, because no one was assigned to that
position over me and I made my reports direct to the general-in-chief;
but I was not assigned to the position of department commander until the
25th of October. General Halleck while commanding the Department of the
Mississippi had had control as far east as a line drawn from Chattanooga
north. My district only embraced West Tennessee and Kentucky west of
the Cumberland River. Buell, with the Army of the Ohio, had, as
previously stated, been ordered east towards Chattanooga, with
instructions to repair the Memphis and Charleston railroad as he
advanced. Troops had been sent north by Halleck along the line of the
Mobile and Ohio railroad to put it in repair as far as Columbus. Other
troops were stationed on the railroad from Jackson, Tennessee, to Grand
Junction, and still others on the road west to Memphis.

The remainder of the magnificent army of 120,000 men which entered
Corinth on the 30th of May had now become so scattered that I was put
entirely on the defensive in a territory whose population was hostile to
the Union. One of the first things I had to do was to construct
fortifications at Corinth better suited to the garrison that could be
spared to man them. The structures that had been built during the
months of May and June were left as monuments to the skill of the
engineer, and others were constructed in a few days, plainer in design
but suited to the command available to defend them.

I disposed the troops belonging to the district in conformity with the
situation as rapidly as possible. The forces at Donelson, Clarksville
and Nashville, with those at Corinth and along the railroad eastward, I
regarded as sufficient for protection against any attack from the west.
The Mobile and Ohio railroad was guarded from Rienzi, south of Corinth,
to Columbus; and the Mississippi Central railroad from Jackson,
Tennessee, to Bolivar. Grand Junction and La Grange on the Memphis
railroad were abandoned.

South of the Army of the Tennessee, and confronting it, was Van Dorn,
with a sufficient force to organize a movable army of thirty-five to
forty thousand men, after being reinforced by Price from Missouri. This
movable force could be thrown against either Corinth, Bolivar or
Memphis; and the best that could be done in such event would be to
weaken the points not threatened in order to reinforce the one that was.
Nothing could be gained on the National side by attacking elsewhere,
because the territory already occupied was as much as the force present
could guard. The most anxious period of the war, to me, was during the
time the Army of the Tennessee was guarding the territory acquired by
the fall of Corinth and Memphis and before I was sufficiently reinforced
to take the offensive. The enemy also had cavalry operating in our
rear, making it necessary to guard every point of the railroad back to
Columbus, on the security of which we were dependent for all our
supplies. Headquarters were connected by telegraph with all points of
the command except Memphis and the Mississippi below Columbus. With
these points communication was had by the railroad to Columbus, then
down the river by boat. To reinforce Memphis would take three or four
days, and to get an order there for troops to move elsewhere would have
taken at least two days. Memphis therefore was practically isolated
from the balance of the command. But it was in Sherman's hands. Then
too the troops were well intrenched and the gunboats made a valuable
auxiliary.

During the two months after the departure of General Halleck there was
much fighting between small bodies of the contending armies, but these
encounters were dwarfed by the magnitude of the main battles so as to be
now almost forgotten except by those engaged in them. Some of them,
however, estimated by the losses on both sides in killed and wounded,
were equal in hard fighting to most of the battles of the Mexican war
which attracted so much of the attention of the public when they
occurred. About the 23d of July Colonel Ross, commanding at Bolivar,
was threatened by a large force of the enemy so that he had to be
reinforced from Jackson and Corinth. On the 27th there was skirmishing
on the Hatchie River, eight miles from Bolivar. On the 30th I learned
from Colonel P. H. Sheridan, who had been far to the south, that Bragg
in person was at Rome, Georgia, with his troops moving by rail (by way
of Mobile) to Chattanooga and his wagon train marching overland to join
him at Rome. Price was at this time at Holly Springs, Mississippi, with
a large force, and occupied Grand Junction as an outpost. I proposed to
the general-in-chief to be permitted to drive him away, but was informed
that, while I had to judge for myself, the best use to make of my troops
WAS NOT TO SCATTER THEM, but hold them ready to reinforce Buell.

The movement of Bragg himself with his wagon trains to Chattanooga
across country, while his troops were transported over a long
round-about road to the same destination, without need of guards except
when in my immediate front, demonstrates the advantage which troops
enjoy while acting in a country where the people are friendly. Buell
was marching through a hostile region and had to have his communications
thoroughly guarded back to a base of supplies. More men were required
the farther the National troops penetrated into the enemy's country. I,
with an army sufficiently powerful to have destroyed Bragg, was purely
on the defensive and accomplishing no more than to hold a force far
inferior to my own.

On the 2d of August I was ordered from Washington to live upon the
country, on the resources of citizens hostile to the government, so far
as practicable. I was also directed to "handle rebels within our lines
without gloves," to imprison them, or to expel them from their homes and
from our lines. I do not recollect having arrested and confined a
citizen (not a soldier) during the entire rebellion. I am aware that a
great many were sent to northern prisons, particularly to Joliet,
Illinois, by some of my subordinates with the statement that it was my
order. I had all such released the moment I learned of their arrest;
and finally sent a staff officer north to release every prisoner who was
said to be confined by my order. There were many citizens at home who
deserved punishment because they were soldiers when an opportunity was
afforded to inflict an injury to the National cause. This class was not
of the kind that were apt to get arrested, and I deemed it better that a
few guilty men should escape than that a great many innocent ones should
suffer.

On the 14th of August I was ordered to send two more divisions to Buell.
They were sent the same day by way of Decatur. On the 22d Colonel
Rodney Mason surrendered Clarksville with six companies of his regiment.

Colonel Mason was one of the officers who had led their regiments off
the field at almost the first fire of the rebels at Shiloh. He was by
nature and education a gentleman, and was terribly mortified at his
action when the battle was over. He came to me with tears in his eyes
and begged to be allowed to have another trial. I felt great sympathy
for him and sent him, with his regiment, to garrison Clarksville and
Donelson. He selected Clarksville for his headquarters, no doubt
because he regarded it as the post of danger, it being nearer the enemy.
But when he was summoned to surrender by a band of guerillas, his
constitutional weakness overcame him. He inquired the number of men the
enemy had, and receiving a response indicating a force greater than his
own he said if he could be satisfied of that fact he would surrender.
Arrangements were made for him to count the guerillas, and having
satisfied himself that the enemy had the greater force he surrendered
and informed his subordinate at Donelson of the fact, advising him to do
the same. The guerillas paroled their prisoners and moved upon
Donelson, but the officer in command at that point marched out to meet
them and drove them away.

Among other embarrassments, at the time of which I now write, was the
fact that the government wanted to get out all the cotton possible from
the South and directed me to give every facility toward that end. Pay
in gold was authorized, and stations on the Mississippi River and on the
railroad in our possession had to be designated where cotton would be
received. This opened to the enemy not only the means of converting
cotton into money, which had a value all over the world and which they
so much needed, but it afforded them means of obtaining accurate and
intelligent information in regard to our position and strength. It was
also demoralizing to the troops. Citizens obtaining permits from the
treasury department had to be protected within our lines and given
facilities to get out cotton by which they realized enormous profits.
Men who had enlisted to fight the battles of their country did not like
to be engaged in protecting a traffic which went to the support of an
enemy they had to fight, and the profits of which went to men who shared
none of their dangers.

On the 30th of August Colonel M. D. Leggett, near Bolivar, with the 20th
and 29th Ohio volunteer infantry, was attacked by a force supposed to be
about 4,000 strong. The enemy was driven away with a loss of more than
one hundred men. On the 1st of September the bridge guard at Medon was
attacked by guerillas. The guard held the position until reinforced,
when the enemy were routed leaving about fifty of their number on the
field dead or wounded, our loss being only two killed and fifteen
wounded. On the same day Colonel Dennis, with a force of less than 500
infantry and two pieces of artillery, met the cavalry of the enemy in
strong force, a few miles west of Medon, and drove them away with great
loss. Our troops buried 179 of the enemy's dead, left upon the field.
Afterwards it was found that all the houses in the vicinity of the
battlefield were turned into hospitals for the wounded. Our loss, as
reported at the time, was forty-five killed and wounded. On the 2d of
September I was ordered to send more reinforcements to Buell. Jackson
and Bolivar were yet threatened, but I sent the reinforcements. On the
4th I received direct orders to send Granger's division also to
Louisville, Kentucky.

General Buell had left Corinth about the 10th of June to march upon
Chattanooga; Bragg, who had superseded Beauregard in command, sent one
division from Tupelo on the 27th of June for the same place. This gave
Buell about seventeen days' start. If he had not been required to repair
the railroad as he advanced, the march could have been made in eighteen
days at the outside, and Chattanooga must have been reached by the
National forces before the rebels could have possibly got there. The
road between Nashville and Chattanooga could easily have been put in
repair by other troops, so that communication with the North would have
been opened in a short time after the occupation of the place by the
National troops. If Buell had been permitted to move in the first
instance, with the whole of the Army of the Ohio and that portion of the
Army of the Mississippi afterwards sent to him, he could have thrown
four divisions from his own command along the line of road to repair and
guard it.

Granger's division was promptly sent on the 4th of September. I was at
the station at Corinth when the troops reached that point, and found
General P. H. Sheridan with them. I expressed surprise at seeing him
and said that I had not expected him to go. He showed decided
disappointment at the prospect of being detained. I felt a little
nettled at his desire to get away and did not detain him.

Sheridan was a first lieutenant in the regiment in which I had served
eleven years, the 4th infantry, and stationed on the Pacific coast when
the war broke out. He was promoted to a captaincy in May, 1861, and
before the close of the year managed in some way, I do not know how, to
get East. He went to Missouri. Halleck had known him as a very
successful young officer in managing campaigns against the Indians on
the Pacific coast, and appointed him acting-quartermaster in south-west
Missouri. There was no difficulty in getting supplies forward while
Sheridan served in that capacity; but he got into difficulty with his
immediate superiors because of his stringent rules for preventing the
use of public transportation for private purposes. He asked to be
relieved from further duty in the capacity in which he was engaged and
his request was granted. When General Halleck took the field in April,
1862, Sheridan was assigned to duty on his staff. During the advance on
Corinth a vacancy occurred in the colonelcy of the 2d Michigan cavalry.
Governor Blair, of Michigan, telegraphed General Halleck asking him to
suggest the name of a professional soldier for the vacancy, saying he
would appoint a good man without reference to his State. Sheridan was
named; and was so conspicuously efficient that when Corinth was reached
he was assigned to command a cavalry brigade in the Army of the
Mississippi. He was in command at Booneville on the 1st of July with
two small regiments, when he was attacked by a force full three times
as numerous as his own. By very skilful manoeuvres and boldness of
attack he completely routed the enemy. For this he was made a
brigadier-general and became a conspicuous figure in the army about
Corinth. On this account I was sorry to see him leaving me. His
departure was probably fortunate, for he rendered distinguished services
in his new field.

Granger and Sheridan reached Louisville before Buell got there, and on
the night of their arrival Sheridan with his command threw up works
around the railroad station for the defence of troops as they came from
the front.

CHAPTER XXVIII.

ADVANCE OF VAN DORN AND PRICE--PRICE ENTERS IUKA--BATTLE OF IUKA.

At this time, September 4th, I had two divisions of the Army of the
Mississippi stationed at Corinth, Rienzi, Jacinto and Danville. There
were at Corinth also Davies' division and two brigades of McArthur's,
besides cavalry and artillery. This force constituted my left wing, of
which Rosecrans was in command. General Ord commanded the centre, from
Bethel to Humboldt on the Mobile and Ohio railroad and from Jackson to
Bolivar where the Mississippi Central is crossed by the Hatchie River.
General Sherman commanded on the right at Memphis with two of his
brigades back at Brownsville, at the crossing of the Hatchie River by
the Memphis and Ohio railroad. This made the most convenient
arrangement I could devise for concentrating all my spare forces upon
any threatened point. All the troops of the command were within
telegraphic communication of each other, except those under Sherman. By
bringing a portion of his command to Brownsville, from which point there
was a railroad and telegraph back to Memphis, communication could be had
with that part of my command within a few hours by the use of couriers.
In case it became necessary to reinforce Corinth, by this arrangement
all the troops at Bolivar, except a small guard, could be sent by rail
by the way of Jackson in less than twenty-four hours; while the troops
from Brownsville could march up to Bolivar to take their place.

On the 7th of September I learned of the advance of Van Dorn and Price,
apparently upon Corinth. One division was brought from Memphis to
Bolivar to meet any emergency that might arise from this move of the
enemy. I was much concerned because my first duty, after holding the
territory acquired within my command, was to prevent further reinforcing
of Bragg in Middle Tennessee. Already the Army of Northern Virginia had
defeated the army under General Pope and was invading Maryland. In the
Centre General Buell was on his way to Louisville and Bragg marching
parallel to him with a large Confederate force for the Ohio River.

I had been constantly called upon to reinforce Buell until at this time
my entire force numbered less than 50,000 men, of all arms. This
included everything from Cairo south within my jurisdiction. If I too
should be driven back, the Ohio River would become the line dividing the
belligerents west of the Alleghanies, while at the East the line was
already farther north than when hostilities commenced at the opening of
the war. It is true Nashville was never given up after its first
capture, but it would have been isolated and the garrison there would
have been obliged to beat a hasty retreat if the troops in West
Tennessee had been compelled to fall back. To say at the end of the
second year of the war the line dividing the contestants at the East was
pushed north of Maryland, a State that had not seceded, and at the West
beyond Kentucky, another State which had been always loyal, would have
been discouraging indeed. As it was, many loyal people despaired in the
fall of 1862 of ever saving the Union. The administration at Washington
was much concerned for the safety of the cause it held so dear. But I
believe there was never a day when the President did not think that, in
some way or other, a cause so just as ours would come out triumphant.

Up to the 11th of September Rosecrans still had troops on the railroad
east of Corinth, but they had all been ordered in. By the 12th all were
in except a small force under Colonel Murphy of the 8th Wisconsin. He
had been detained to guard the remainder of the stores which had not yet
been brought in to Corinth.

On the 13th of September General Sterling Price entered Iuka, a town
about twenty miles east of Corinth on the Memphis and Charleston
railroad. Colonel Murphy with a few men was guarding the place. He
made no resistance, but evacuated the town on the approach of the enemy.
I was apprehensive lest the object of the rebels might be to get troops
into Tennessee to reinforce Bragg, as it was afterwards ascertained to
be. The authorities at Washington, including the general-in-chief of
the army, were very anxious, as I have said, about affairs both in East
and Middle Tennessee; and my anxiety was quite as great on their account
as for any danger threatening my command. I had not force enough at
Corinth to attack Price even by stripping everything; and there was
danger that before troops could be got from other points he might be far
on his way across the Tennessee. To prevent this all spare forces at
Bolivar and Jackson were ordered to Corinth, and cars were concentrated
at Jackson for their transportation. Within twenty-four hours from the
transmission of the order the troops were at their destination, although
there had been a delay of four hours resulting from the forward train
getting off the track and stopping all the others. This gave a
reinforcement of near 8,000 men, General Ord in command. General
Rosecrans commanded the district of Corinth with a movable force of
about 9,000 independent of the garrison deemed necessary to be left
behind. It was known that General Van Dorn was about a four days' march
south of us, with a large force. It might have been part of his plan to
attack at Corinth, Price coming from the east while he came up from the
south. My desire was to attack Price before Van Dorn could reach
Corinth or go to his relief.

General Rosecrans had previously had his headquarters at Iuka, where his
command was spread out along the Memphis and Charleston railroad
eastward. While there he had a most excellent map prepared showing all
the roads and streams in the surrounding country. He was also
personally familiar with the ground, so that I deferred very much to him
in my plans for the approach. We had cars enough to transport all of
General Ord's command, which was to go by rail to Burnsville, a point on
the road about seven miles west of Iuka. From there his troops were to
march by the north side of the railroad and attack Price from the
north-west, while Rosecrans was to move eastward from his position south
of Corinth by way of the Jacinto road. A small force was to hold the
Jacinto road where it turns to the north-east, while the main force
moved on the Fulton road which comes into Iuka further east. This plan
was suggested by Rosecrans.

Bear Creek, a few miles to the east of the Fulton road, is a formidable
obstacle to the movement of troops in the absence of bridges, all of
which, in September, 1862, had been destroyed in that vicinity. The
Tennessee, to the north-east, not many miles away, was also a formidable
obstacle for an army followed by a pursuing force. Ord was on the
north-west, and even if a rebel movement had been possible in that
direction it could have brought only temporary relief, for it would have
carried Price's army to the rear of the National forces and isolated it
from all support. It looked to me that, if Price would remain in Iuka
until we could get there, his annihilation was inevitable.

On the morning of the 18th of September General Ord moved by rail to
Burnsville, and there left the cars and moved out to perform his part of
the programme. He was to get as near the enemy as possible during the
day and intrench himself so as to hold his position until the next
morning. Rosecrans was to be up by the morning of the 19th on the two
roads before described, and the attack was to be from all three quarters
simultaneously. Troops enough were left at Jacinto and Rienzi to detain
any cavalry that Van Dorn might send out to make a sudden dash into
Corinth until I could be notified. There was a telegraph wire along the
railroad, so there would be no delay in communication. I detained cars
and locomotives enough at Burnsville to transport the whole of Ord's
command at once, and if Van Dorn had moved against Corinth instead of
Iuka I could have thrown in reinforcements to the number of 7,000 or
8,000 before he could have arrived. I remained at Burnsville with a
detachment of about 900 men from Ord's command and communicated with my
two wings by courier. Ord met the advance of the enemy soon after
leaving Burnsville. Quite a sharp engagement ensued, but he drove the
rebels back with considerable loss, including one general officer
killed. He maintained his position and was ready to attack by daylight
the next morning. I was very much disappointed at receiving a dispatch
from Rosecrans after midnight from Jacinto, twenty-two miles from Iuka,
saying that some of his command had been delayed, and that the rear of
his column was not yet up as far as Jacinto. He said, however, that he
would still be at Iuka by two o'clock the next day. I did not believe
this possible because of the distance and the condition of the roads,
which was bad; besides, troops after a forced march of twenty miles are
not in a good condition for fighting the moment they get through. It
might do in marching to relieve a beleaguered garrison, but not to make
an assault. I immediately sent Ord a copy of Rosecrans' dispatch and
ordered him to be in readiness to attack the moment he heard the sound
of guns to the south or south-east. He was instructed to notify his
officers to be on the alert for any indications of battle. During the
19th the wind blew in the wrong direction to transmit sound either
towards the point where Ord was, or to Burnsville where I had remained.