A.D. 1863.]

hundreds of exhausted and famished Confederates, whom the unwonted sense of failure had depressed and demoralised. The Potomac, rising in flood, carried away the bridge which Lee had caused to be thrown over it at Williamsport; and while he was still on the northern side of the river, taking measures to restore the bridge, Meade with his victorious army was upon him. Another desperate battle seemed to be imminent. But Meade called a council of war on the 12th, the opinion of which was adverse to attacking; and, on the night of the 13th, Lee, having replaced the bridge, brought his army over with little loss, and was again in comparative safety in Virginia.

Bad news awaited him here-no less than the fall of Vicksburg, the stronghold on the Mississippi which had so long resisted the Federal arms; the capture of Jackson, the state capital of Mississippi; and the hopeless collapse of the Confederate power in all that region. By the exercise of what undaunted perseverance General Grant, contending against all kinds of natural obstacles as well as against an active and powerful enemy, had by slow degrees accomplished this immense result, we must now briefly explain.

Vicksburg, perched on a high rolling bluff on the east bank of the Mississippi, about midway between the confluence of the Ohio and the sea, in the midst of a rich cotton-growing country, and in direct communication by rail with Jackson, the capital of Mississippi, was the natural centre and chief citadel of the Confederacy. Its natural strength had been enormously increased by extensive and well-planned fortifications; its powerful batteries commanded the river; and while it was in the possession of the Confederates, the Federal power, though supreme both on the upper and the lower course of the river, could not be said to have the complete control of the Mississippi. Grant, therefore, whose department of Western Tennessee had, after his successes at Forts Henry and Donelson and elsewhere in that state in 1862, been enlarged so as to include the state of Mississippi, directed his thoughts from an early period to the reduction of this important stronghold. In the last month of 1862, he was preparing to advance on Jackson, as the first step towards his object, when the surprise and destruction of his depot of arms and stores at Holly Springs, in Northern Mississippi, by the Confederate General Van Dorn (December 20), disabled him for a time from any forward movement. An attempt was made about the same time by General Sherman and Admiral Porter, who were stationed with a considerable body of troops and a fleet of war-steamers at Milliken's Bend, a point some twenty miles above Vicksburg, to storm the defences of the place from the north. Dropping down the river to the mouth of the Yazoo (a considerable stream which meanders at the foot of the bluffs on which the fortress stood, and then joins the Mississippi), they steamed up that river some miles, and then landed the troops. Sherman led his men gallantly to the assault of the bluffs, but there was a sluggish marshy stream, Chickasaw Bayou, which had first to be crossed under fire, and the difficulty proved to be insurmountable.

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Sherman lost 2,000 men in this fruitless expedition, and returned (January 2, 1863) to his former quarters at Milliken's Bend.

Various other attempts were made, and met with the like ill success. Vicksburg stands on the convex side of a great bend of the river, and it was thought that a canal might be cut across the chord of this bend, down which the "Father of Waters" might be induced to flow, so as to leave the channel dry in front of the fortress, and render its batteries innocuous. A host of negroes was collected, and set to this work. It had made some progress; but the Mississippi scorned to be thus dictated to, and, rising in a sudden flood, drowned out the excavators, washed away their embankments, and utterly baffled the enterprise. An attempt also was made to bring some armed steamers into the Yazoo from above, through a channel called Yazoo Pass; but this likewise was defeated with loss.

In that immense system of waters, the Federal gunboats, numerous as they were, could not guard or visit all points; and the Confederates, having collected a number of steamers at Vicksburg, Yazoo city, and other points, busily employed themselves in arming and ironplating them. Against these Admiral Porter dispatched down the river a formidable iron-clad, armed with 11-inch and 9-inch guns, the Indianola, which ran past the Vicksburg batteries without receiving any injury. But encountering soon after several small Confederate steamers, the Indianola, in the fight that ensued, was so butted, battered, raked, and dodged by her-singly insignificant-antagonists, that she was compelled to surrender. The prize was important, and its capture augured well for at least a temporary naval ascendency of the Confederates in those waters. But the fruits of their success were blasted by a laughable stratagem of Admiral Porter's, which the Federal historian designates a "Yankee trick." "A worthless coal flat-boat, fitted up, covered, and decorated by Porter, with furnaces of mud and smoke-stacks of pork-barrels, to counterfeit a terrible ram, was let loose by him, unmanned, above Vicksburg, and floated down by the batteries, eliciting and surviving a tremendous cannonade. The rebels in Vicksburg hastened to give warning of this fearful monster. The Indianola was now undergoing repairs near the point where she was captured; and word was sent from Vicksburg that she must be burnt at once to save her from the monster's clutches. A few hours later, when it had been discovered that they had been thrown into hysterics by an old coal-boat, fresh word was sent that they had been sold; but, ere this arrived, the Indianola had been blown to splinters-not even her priceless guns having been saved.”

Months had now passed by since the earlier attempts upon Vicksburg; and General Grant, finding that his attacks from the west-or from the north, by obtaining the command of the Yazoo river-were baffled by apparently insurmountable obstacles, now decided on an entirely new line of operations. He resolved to turn Vicksburg on the south, march first upon Jackson, overpowering any resistance which he might meet with from

Confederate armies in the field (for which he had ample and more than ample force), and then advance upon Vicksburg from the east. At the end of March, 1863, he set his troops in motion from Milliken's Bend, down the western bank, to a point opposite a little village called Bruinsburg, some thirty miles below Vicksburg. But his army now must be transported to the eastern bank; and for this purpose he requested Admiral Porter to run past the batteries of Vicksburg, with his iron-clads and a number of transports. Porter at once complied, sustaining during the operation a loss which, though severe, was not serious enough to cripple him, and joined Grant below Vicksburg. Now the army was embarked on the war-steamers and transports, and ferried across. Just at this juncture the Confederate troops in Mississippi appear to have been ill led; instead of concentrating in front of Jackson, they were hurled in detail against Grant's advancing columns, and suffered consequently a succession of small reverses, which had a fatally depressing effect on their morale. At Port Gibson, Raymond, and before Jackson, actions were fought, and with uniform good fortune to the Federals. General Jo. Johnston was now appointed to the chief command of the Confederate forces. But the Confederacy, girdled round both by sea and land with a circle of fire, allowed no rest, compelled to make head on a hundred points at once against implacable assailants, cut off from all foreign supplies, was now drawing towards the end of its resources, especially its resources in men. On the other hind, the unchecked emigration from Europe provided the Federal Government with the raw material of soldiers to an almost unlimited extent. Mr. Whiteside said, in the House of Commons, about the beginning of 1864, that during the past thirteen months upwards of 100,000 men had quitted the shores of Ireland, to swell the ranks of the Federal army of America. Granting that this statement was much exaggerated, still it is certain that the waste and depletion of their armies was so effectually replaced from this source, that the Federal Government —who, to gratify their Republican ambition of "saving the country," lavished human life as unsparingly as any despot who ever reigned-were seldom at a loss for men to execute any military operation that the generals might project.

Defeated in front of Jackson, the Confederates evacmated the city, after having removed all their arms and stores to a safer place, or else destroyed them. This was on the 14th of May. General Johnston collected his shattered forces at a point farther north, and sent orders to General Pemberton, commanding in Vicksburg, to march out with a portion of the garrison and join him. But before Pemberton could do so, the Federals were upon him; and he sustained a serious defeat in a bloody action at Champion Hills (May 16), between Jackson and Vicksburg, on the line of the Big Black river. The Confederates were driven into Vicksburg, and Grant found himself at last under the walls of the fortress, the possession of which he had so long coveted. Without delay he ordered an assault on the outer line of works, reckoning perhaps, as it was said

Lord Raglan and Marshal St. Arnaud ought to have reckoned after the battle of the Alma, on finding the defenders demoralised, and, in the flush of victory, carrying all before him. If so, the result justified their conduct on that memorable occasion; for the assault was repulsed, with the loss of nearly 3,000 men. Grant then regularly invested the place, and proceeded to open trenches and dig mines. Pemberton defended the place with great skill and determination; but provisions ran short, there was no hope of relief from without, and the fierce sun of Mississippi exhausted his harassed men, who were required to defend a line of entrenchments and earthworks too extensive for their now reduced numbers. After forty-five days of isolation, Pemberton, quite at the end of his resources, hung out a white flag, and proposed to come to terms for surrendering the place. Grant would hear of nothing but an unconditional surrender. A conference between him and Pemberton was then arranged, at which Grant heard all that was proposed on the other side, and said that he would send us answer before night. After conferring with his majorgenerals, Grant wrote to Pemberton, offering the following terms: that upon the surrender of the city, public stores, &c., tho officers and men of the garrison should be allowed to depart, giving their parole not to serve again during the war, the officers being permitted to take one horse each, and both officers and men taking with them their clothing, but no other property. Pemberton might take for the use of the garrison any amount of rations he might deem necessary, from the stores he then had. There was a stroke of grim humour in this; for Pemberton, not wishing it to be thought that the garrison was reduced to extremities, had proposed to take with him eight days' rations; and Grant well knew that his stores were far too attenuated for that; indeed, the famished men applied for rations at the Federal camp on the day after the surrender. Vicksburg fell on the 3rd of July.

Still everything was not lost beyond the Alleghanies, so long as General Bragg, commanding at Chattanooga, could keep the field, and preserve that most important position. Chattanooga is a small town on the Tennessee river, close to the southern border of the state of the same name, and adjoining the boundary lines of three other states-Georgia, Alabama, and North Carolina. On one side it was protected by the river, here flowing deep and wide; on the other an intrenched camp had been constructed, and fortified with great care. Mountain ridges encompassed it on all sides, rendering the marching of armies difficult: in fact, it was the key of all that region; so that while it was in Confederate hands, a Federal army could not, without great risk, advance out of Tennessee into Georgia, or Alabama, or even into the Carolinas. But Chattanooga once lost, a direct way was open for the Federal armies into Georgia, with a strong base to retire upon in case of a reverse. These considerations weighed so strongly with Lee, that, at the risk of dangerously weakening his army in Virginia, he detached Longstreet, in the autumn of 1863, with 20,000 men, to the aid of Bragg. But before relating the operations which

Chattanooga (November 24 and 25), and forced it to fall back upon Ringgold, in Georgia. Sherman was immediately sent with a superior force to the relief of Knoxville, and Longstreet, unable to risk a battle, fell back across the mountains into Virginia.

The campaign in the West was now over, and everywhere the Confederates had been foiled. Vicksburg was lost, the Mississippi wholly under Federal control, East Tennessee lost, Chattanooga lost, and the way into Georgia left open. Of the remarkable expedition which this last circumstance occasioned, we shall hear in a future chapter.

The retreat into Virginia after the battle of Gettysburg brought no repose to Lee's army. Meade also crossed the Potomac, and re-occupied all the country as far as the Rappahannock. But having been required by the Commander-in-Chief, General Halleck, to detach two corps under Hooker to the aid of the Federal army at Chattanooga, and learning that Lee was approaching the fords higher up the river so as to menace his right flank, Meade fell back upon Centerville and even as far as Fairfax Court House, the Confederates, though with far inferior force, audaciously pursuing. Lee now carefully destroyed the Orange and Alexandria railway, connecting Washington with the Rappahannock, and fortified a têtedu-pont on that river. This was in October, and the campaign seemed at last to be over. But Mr. Lincoln's policy was to "keep hammering away" continually, and to give the South no rest. Sedgwick, therefore, was ordered, early in November, to attack the tête-du-pont on the Rappahannock, which he did, and successfully, his troops carrying the work by assault, and making prisoners of the chief part of the garrison. Meade then resolved upon a winter campaign. He crossed the Rappahannock, and also the Rapidan, meeting with little resistance till he reached a stream called Mine Run, running in a northerly direction into the Rapidan. Lee's army was strongly posted to the west of this stream, and awaited the attack, which, however, never came; for Meade, after having made every preparation for turning Lee's position on the left, since it was too strong to be forced in front, was informed by the general whom he had charged with the operation that he found the obstacles to an advance so serious that it would be imprudent to attempt it. This was on the 30th of November. Meade acquiesced, and led back his army unpursued across the Rappahannock; and thus, for the armies in Virginia, terminated the campaign of 1863.

Except in Texas, the tide of military fortune along all the coasts of the Confederacy had from the first-with an occasional slight reflux here and there-flowed steadily for the Federal cause. We proceed to give a summary of the more important operations.

Galveston, the chief sea-port of Texas, and Sabine Pass, an important point on the coast higher up, had been occupied by the Federal naval power since 1861. On the last day of 1862, a brilliant and successful attack by the Confederate General Magruder resulted in the recapture of Galveston, with heavy loss to the Federal squadron :tationed there. The gun-boat Harriet Lane, after an

obstinate contest with two Confederate steamers, barricaded with cotton-bales, which had come down from the inland waters, was carried by boarding; the Westfield, armed with eight heavy rifled guns, was driven on shore, and blown up by her commander; and the officer left in command of the squadron (for his superior had been killed in the action), thinking that his force was now too weak to hold the place, abandoned Galveston to Magruder and sailed for New Orleans. In this action one of those terrible rencounters took place which are incident to civil war. The captain of the Harriet Lane having been killed, the command devolved on a Lieutenant Lee, whose father was a major in the Confederate service. This Major Lee was one of the boarding party which carried the Harriet Lane; the lieutenant commanding was mortally wounded in the conflict; and when the ship was in the hands of the boarders, the father was one of the first to recognise his bleeding and dying son.

At Sabine Pass soon after (January 31, 1863) a collision occurred which had a similar result. The broad estuary at the mouth of the Sabine was blockaded by the gun-boats Morning Light and Velocity; these were attacked by two Confederate gun-boats, fitted out in the Sabine for the purpose, under the command of Major Watkins, who chased the Federal gun-boats out to sea and captured them after a very feeble resistance. The result of these actions was that the blockade was for a short time really raised along a large portion of the Texan coast. Ships, however, were soon sent down from New Orleans to re-establish it. Much desultory fighting took place in Texas during 1863, with results, indecisive indeed, but generally favourable to the Confederates.

But in Florida, Georgia, and South Carolina, the persistence and the inexhaustible naval resources of the Federals made a continually deepening impression. Fort Pulaski, on the Savannah river, a Federal fort before the war, was cannonaded and compelled to surrender in April, 1862. Pensacola, in Florida, was evacuated by its Confederate garrison in the following May. At an earlier period (January, 1862), the naval officer in command of the blockading fleet off Charleston caused hulks laden with stones to be sunk across one of the ship channels leading into Charleston harbour, so as to make the work of watching and catching the blockade-runners less arduous. A great outery was raised when the news of this measure reached Europe. The Federal Government, in attempting to ruin a fine harbour for the sake of a military object, was charged with warring against the common rights and permanent interests of civilised man. If, however, Mr. Greeley is to be trusted, no such effect was either intended or produced. "No complaint has since been made of any actual injury thus inflicted on the peaceful commerce of Charleston; on the contrary, it has been plausibly asserted that the partial closing of one of the passes, through which the waters of Ashley and Cooper rivers find their way to the ocean, was calculated to deepen and improve those remaining."* Nothing more of moment took place in 1862. On the

Greeley, "American Conflict," vol. ii. p. 458.