swarming with many thousands of Yankee soldiers who had been carefully posted all along the railroad for the specific purpose of beating off raids like this; and no matter how the raid went, in the end these Confederates would have to get back across the river with many times their number hotly pursuing them. By any logical appraisal of the prospects, this expedition had no chance . . . except that it was being led by Forrest.
Forrest was self-made all the way, a brigadier general with no military background whatever and no social background worth mentioning, a man who would be wholly out of place in the gallery of Confederate officers were it not that he was, inexplicably, a military genius: the best man in either the Confederacy or the Union for the kind of exploit Bragg was demanding. The measure of his capacity lies in what he now accomplished. He completely disrupted all of the Federal plans—Halleck's, Grant's, McClernand's, everybody's—and with excellent assistance from the romantic Van Dorn, who launched a simultaneous strike at Grant's immediate rear, he made Bragg's hopeful prediction good: Grant did have to retreat, getting out of Mississippi entirely and going all the way back to Memphis. Quite incidentally, Forrest armed, equipped, recruited and fed his cavalry while he was doing all of this. When the raid ended he had more men than he had when it began, all of them excellently mounted, armed, clad and fed by the United States government.
Forrest's cavalry started from the town of Columbia, southwest of Murfreesboro, on December 11. Forrest crossed the Tennessee River at Clifton, swimming his animals and taking his men over, a troop at a time, in an old flatboat; then he struck west, routing a Federal cavalry detachment on the way, and coming up to the railroad junction town of Jackson, Tennessee, where Grant's Mississippi Central stemmed off of the principal north-south line, the Mobile & Ohio. Veering away from Jackson, which the Federals held in force, Forrest went rampaging north along the Mobile & Ohio, capturing Union supply and ammunition dumps, brushing off hostile patrols, seizing the horses, weapons, and other equipment he needed, and utterly ruining the railroad for a stretch of sixty miles or more. Grant sent powerful contingents of cavalry and infantry to destroy this marauder, but Forrest was extremely elusive. One Federal column at last got in his path at Parker's Cross Roads, a converging column came up from Forrest's rear, and there was a sharp fight in which Forrest lost 300 men; but at last Forrest broke away, shook off his pursuers, got to the Tennessee, retrieved the flatboat he had used earlier, and got his expedition safely over to Confederate territory on the eastern side of the river. He had put 2500 Federals out of action, had captured ten pieces of artillery and 10,000 small arms, and had completely broken Grant's communications with the outside world for ten days. 12
The first result was that neither McClernand nor Sherman got Grant's December 18 orders until many days later. Obeying his earlier orders—-which, as far as he knew, were still in force—Sherman started south from Memphis on December 20. McClernand, receiving his own orders only after this force had reached the vicinity of Vicksburg, could do no more than get on a steamboat in frantic pursuit, complaining bitterly that because of "petty jealousy somewhere in high authority" he had been the victim of exceedingly sharp practice. 13 He was correct in his belief that neither Halleck nor Grant wanted him to command the Vicksburg expedition; but both men had dutifully followed the President's directive, and neither could really be blamed for the fact that Forrest's troopers cut the Mobile & Ohio telegraph line on the evening of December 18 just in time to prevent transmission of Grant's dispatches.
Grant was in an even more embarrassing position than
McClernand. With his line of supply coming down from Columbus,
Forrest was self-made all the way, a brigadier general with no military background whatever and no social background worth mentioning, a man who would be wholly out of place in the gallery of Confederate officers were it not that he was, inexplicably, a military genius: the best man in either the Confederacy or the Union for the kind of exploit Bragg was demanding. The measure of his capacity lies in what he now accomplished. He completely disrupted all of the Federal plans—Halleck's, Grant's, McClernand's, everybody's—and with excellent assistance from the romantic Van Dorn, who launched a simultaneous strike at Grant's immediate rear, he made Bragg's hopeful prediction good: Grant did have to retreat, getting out of Mississippi entirely and going all the way back to Memphis. Quite incidentally, Forrest armed, equipped, recruited and fed his cavalry while he was doing all of this. When the raid ended he had more men than he had when it began, all of them excellently mounted, armed, clad and fed by the United States government.
Forrest's cavalry started from the town of Columbia, southwest of Murfreesboro, on December 11. Forrest crossed the Tennessee River at Clifton, swimming his animals and taking his men over, a troop at a time, in an old flatboat; then he struck west, routing a Federal cavalry detachment on the way, and coming up to the railroad junction town of Jackson, Tennessee, where Grant's Mississippi Central stemmed off of the principal north-south line, the Mobile & Ohio. Veering away from Jackson, which the Federals held in force, Forrest went rampaging north along the Mobile & Ohio, capturing Union supply and ammunition dumps, brushing off hostile patrols, seizing the horses, weapons, and other equipment he needed, and utterly ruining the railroad for a stretch of sixty miles or more. Grant sent powerful contingents of cavalry and infantry to destroy this marauder, but Forrest was extremely elusive. One Federal column at last got in his path at Parker's Cross Roads, a converging column came up from Forrest's rear, and there was a sharp fight in which Forrest lost 300 men; but at last Forrest broke away, shook off his pursuers, got to the Tennessee, retrieved the flatboat he had used earlier, and got his expedition safely over to Confederate territory on the eastern side of the river. He had put 2500 Federals out of action, had captured ten pieces of artillery and 10,000 small arms, and had completely broken Grant's communications with the outside world for ten days. 12
The first result was that neither McClernand nor Sherman got Grant's December 18 orders until many days later. Obeying his earlier orders—-which, as far as he knew, were still in force—Sherman started south from Memphis on December 20. McClernand, receiving his own orders only after this force had reached the vicinity of Vicksburg, could do no more than get on a steamboat in frantic pursuit, complaining bitterly that because of "petty jealousy somewhere in high authority" he had been the victim of exceedingly sharp practice. 13 He was correct in his belief that neither Halleck nor Grant wanted him to command the Vicksburg expedition; but both men had dutifully followed the President's directive, and neither could really be blamed for the fact that Forrest's troopers cut the Mobile & Ohio telegraph line on the evening of December 18 just in time to prevent transmission of Grant's dispatches.
Grant was in an even more embarrassing position than
McClernand. With his line of supply coming down from Columbus,
Similar Books
