The Times Great Military Lives: Leadership and Courage – from Waterloo to the Falklands in Obituaries. Ian Brunskill

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СКАЧАТЬ tried various occupations in civilian life at various places, finally going to Galena, Illinois, in 1859, to join his father, who was a tanner.

      When the American civil war began, in the spring of 1861, Grant’s fortunes were at a low ebb and he was ready for almost anything that promised an improvement. The opening of the civil war found the country without an army, and the entire North aflame to raise a volunteer soldiery. The few men in different parts of the States who had been officers of the regular army, and particularly those who had seen active service in Mexico and on the frontier, at once advanced to a high place in the popular estimation, as the main reliance in officering the new force. A company of volunteer troops was formed at Galena and selected Grant for its captain. He was 39 years of age when, a day or two after the firing upon Fort Sumter, he marched his company to Springfield, the capital of Illinois, and offered his services to the Governor of the State.

      The next few weeks saw a remarkable uprising, military organizations forming and drilling all over the country, and being made up into regiments and sent to the seat of war. Governor Yates selected Captain Grant as his aide-de-camp and mustering officer to organize the State troops of Illinois, and this service occupied him nearly two months. He organized 21 regiments, and on June 1, 1861, was commissioned as colonel of the 21st Illinois Regiment. During the remainder of this month he drilled his regiment, and in July crossed over the Mississippi river and was ordered to guard the Hannibal and St. Joseph Railroad, which crosses the northern part of the State of Missouri, and was in constant danger of destruction by guerilla raids. Promotion was rapid in the early part of the civil war, especially for veteran officers, and August found him practically in command of all the troops in Northern Missouri, a part of the force under General John Pope, and on August 23 he was made brigadier-general of volunteers, his commission being dated May 17, 1861.

      The qualities of General Grant, both as a fighter and as a strategist, were early recognized, and his remarkable military career may be regarded as beginning in August, when he was sent to take command at Cairo, the point of junction of the Ohio and Mississippi rivers. This important post was threatened by Confederates in Kentucky, and also by a disaffected element in Southern Illinois and Missouri; and a large force of Union troops was concentrated there. Grant had not been there long before he made up his mind that safety would be best assured by holding the strategic points of the Mississippi river below the Ohio river, and also those on the Kentucky shore of the latter stream. In September he seized and garrisoned Paducah, at the mouth of the Tennessee river, and Smithland, at the mouth of the Cumberland river, and thus got control of Western Kentucky. His firm, straightforward, and sententious character was shown in his proclamation to the citizens of Paducah, in which he said, ‘I have nothing to do with opinions, and shall deal only with armed rebellion and its aiders and abettors.’ Having thus cared for the Confederates on the eastern side of the Mississippi, in October he began a campaign against those on the western shore, where General Jeff Thompson had assembled a formidable force.

      Grant sent out a detachment from Cairo to check their advance, which was done in a battle at Fredericktown, Missouri, and then, taking the field in person, he fought on November 7, with two brigades. the battle of Belmont, Missouri, his first contest of the war, having a horse shot under him. This movement effectually demoralized the Confederates in the southern counties of Missouri. Grant, who was in every sense a fighter, then began preparing for an active campaign further southward, and made Paducah his base.

      Here he gathered a force of 15,000 men, and also assembled a fleet of western river steamboats, sheathed with iron as a bullet-proof protection, and known as ‘tin-clads.’ The enemy had strongly garrisoned posts near the boundary line between Kentucky and Tennessee, known as Forts Henry and Donelson, the former controlling the Tennessee river and the latter the Cumberland. With his troops and steamers on February 3 he left Paducah to attack them. Fort Henry was first invested, and on February 6 surrendered, its capture being mainly the work of the boats. Fort Donelson, commanded by General Buckner, made a stubborn resistance, and Grant gradually increased his force besieging it to 30,000 men, who fought a severe battle on February 15, losing 2,300 killed and wounded. The fort was shattered, and Buckner proposed that Commissioners be appointed to arrange terms of capitulation.

      Grant promptly wrote in reply:– ‘No terms other than an unconditional and immediate surrender can be accepted. I propose to move immediately upon your works.’ On the 16th the fort, with its defenders, surrendered, being the first great victory that had crowned tho Union arms, which had been generally unfortunate in the campaign east of the Alleghanies. The victor at once became a national celebrity, and the sobriquet of ‘Unconditional Surrender Grant’ was given him as the popular testimony of admiration of his terse demand for the surrender that had given so much gratification. He was commissioned Major-General, dating from February 16, 1862.

      Grant’s subsequent career became practically the history of the war for the suppression of the rebellion. General Halleck had been placed in general command of all the troops west of the Alleghanies, and he had been collecting a force of about 40,000 men to make an expedition up the Tennessee river, under General Smith; but soon after it started General Smith died, and the command fell upon General Grant. An attack upon Corinth, in Northern Mississippi, had been contemplated, and part of the force in anticipation of this had been lying some time at Pittsburg Landing, when at daylight on April 6 General Albert Sydney Johnston, with an overwhelming Confederate army, surprised and routed them with great loss. Grant arrived on the field in the morning and re-formed the broken lines, after which heavy reinforcements, under General Buell, were ordered up, and, arriving in the night, the battle was renewed next day; and the enemy, being defeated, withdrew behind the intrenchment at Corinth.

      These were the bloodiest conflicts that had taken place down to that time, the killed and wounded numbering 12,000 in each army, and Grant being slightly wounded. The Confederates were followed to Corinth, and General Halleck arriving assumed command, and began a siege of the place. This continued several weeks, the enemy subsequently evacuating their works. Halleck was called to Washington in July, after M’Clellan’s disastrous retreat from before Richmond, and Grant was given command of the Department of West Tennessee. The country looked to him as the hero of the western active campaign, the defeats and disasters in Virginia having caused general dismay. He made his headquarters at Corinth, which was a post of strategic importance in Northern Mississippi, and for two months devoted his attention to suppressing guerrillas and spies and strengthening his force preparatory to a new campaign.

      He took possession of Memphis, and severely disciplined a newspaper there which published treasonable articles. In September he sent out an expedition which attacked and defeated the Confederates under General Price at Iuka, gaining a substantial victory. In the meantime General Bragg, with another Confederate force, began pushing northwards towards the Ohio river through the country to the eastward, and the better to check this advance Grant removed his headquarters to Jackson, Tennessee, with part of his guns. He left about 20,000 men, under General Rosecrans, at Corinth, and the enemy, under Price and van Dorn, hoping to beat him in detail, attacked Corinth with 40,000 men on October 3. After a desperate battle, continuing two days, Rosecrans successfully repulsed them, while General Buell, with an auxiliary force, moved out to intercept Bragg, and forced the latter to give up his advance towards the Ohio river and retreat towards East Tennessee.

      General Grant was thus left free for a march further southward, and in the middle of October his department was expanded to include Vicksburg, his troops being constituted the Thirteenth Army Corps. Vicksburg was the great Confederate stronghold on the Mississippi river, and the active and energetic commander soon conceived the idea of trying to capture it. This occupied his attention for several months. He first approached it from the north, but the enemy outmanoeuvred him, and inflicted serious losses in December by capturing and destroying much of his stores at Holly Springs, in Mississippi. He then determined to make his attack from the southward. When the severity of the winter had passed he crossed over with his army to the western bank of the Mississippi river, moved down, and re-crossed at a point below Vicksburg on April 30, 1863. Vicksburg was commanded by Pemberton, and, as soon as he divined Grant’s movement, he sent СКАЧАТЬ