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

Чтение книги онлайн.

СКАЧАТЬ minor engagements, Grant during the early part of May prevented this, and on May 18 he began the siege of Vicksburg. For fully a year this ‘Gibraltar’ had obstructed the navigation of the Mississippi by the Union forces, whose gun-boats had control of the river both above and below, although at Port Hudson, 120 miles further down, the Confederates were building extensive fortifications. General Pemberton had about 25,000 effective men, but was deficient in small ammunition, and had only 60 days’ rations. He contracted his lines, concentrating all his forces in the immediate defences of the town, and abandoned Haines’s Bluff. Johnston advised Pemberton to evacuate Vicksberg if the bluff was untenable, and march to the north-east, he himself moving so as to expedite a junction of their forces. Pemberton replied that it was impossible to withdraw, and that he had decided to hold Vicksburg as long as possible, conceiving it to be the most important point in the Confederacy.

      Grant no sooner began the siege than he tried on May 19 to carry the place by a coup de main, but he was repulsed, and then made a regular investiture. His force was soon increased to 70,000 men, and he maintained the siege until July 3, when Pemberton sent him a note stating that he was fully able to hold his defensive position for an indefinite period, but proposing that Commissioners should be named to arrange a capitulation. Grant met Pemberton personally in the afternoon to arrange the terms, and the actual surrender followed next morning, July 4, 1863. There were 27,000 prisoners paroled altogether, of whom about 15,000 were fit for duty, the others being sick or wounded. From the time he crossed the Mississippi, Grant had lost 8,567 killed and wounded, half of them in the immediate siege. The Confederate loss during the same period was about 10,000. This victory caused a great sensation throughout the country, which had been depressed by repeated defeats in Virginia and by Lee’s march northward into Pennsylvania until checked by General Meade at Gettysburg; and Grant from that time became the great hero of the war. He had been a Major-General of Volunteers and was promoted to Major-General in the Regular Army, the highest rank he could attain as the law then existed.

      General Grant was in October given the supreme command west of the mountains, his territory being called the ‘Military Division of the Mississippi,’ with departments under him, commanded respectively by Generals Sherman, Thomas, Burnside, and Hooker. After Vicksburg fell, his troops had driven Johnston’s forces eastward, and they with Bragg’s troops, which had gone into East Tennessee, began threatening Chattanooga. This picturesque town nestles among the Alleghany Mountains near the southern border of Tennessee, and Bragg occupied formidable positions nearby on Missionary Ridge and Lookout Mountain. Grant, in November, concentrated troops for the defence of Chattanooga, and on the 24th and 25th Bragg’s strongholds were carried by assault, and he abandoned that portion of the mountain district, retreating into Georgia. The Union troops pursued him some distance and then turned to relieve Burnside at Knoxville in East Tennessee, whom the Confederates had besieged, General Longstreet commanding them. These were the last active movements in the west which General Grant personally directed.

      The successive failures in the east, in the campaigns made in Virginia by various generals for the capture of the Confederate capital at Richmond, caused a popular demand that the young commander who had so distinguished himself in the west should be placed in charge of what was regarded as the chief theatre of the war. When Congress convened in December, 1863, the first measure passed was a resolution ordering a gold medal to be struck for Grant, and returning thanks to him and his army. His name was on every tongue, and preparatory to giving him control of all the armies, Congress in March, 1804, created the rank of Lieutenant-General of the Army, and President Lincoln immediately appointed him. When his appointment was announced he at once went to Washington, arriving March 9, and received his commission.

      He was given entire control as Commander-in-Chief of all the campaigns against the Confederacy. Never before during the war had any general in the field commanded all the Union armies. All previous generals in Virginia had been trammelled and thwarted by the powers in Washington. This political interference was thenceforward to cease; and it did cease in reality, Grant during the remaining year of the war being an autocrat whose will was the supreme law in military affairs. He returned to the west, and at Nashville, March 17, issued his order taking command, announcing that his headquarters would be in the field and with the ‘Army of the Potomac.’ He had nearly 700,000 men in active service under him.

      At Nashville, in connexion with General Sherman, he planned two campaigns, east and west of the mountains. Sherman was to operate against Johnston’s forces at Atlanta, Georgia; and Meade was to move against Lee at Richmond, the latter movement being supervised by General Grant in person. Returning to the east he got his troops in readiness to advance as soon as the opening of spring permitted. The movement against Richmond began May 3, 1864, Grant crossing the Rapidan river with the Army of the Potomac, and a few days later being reinforced by Burnside’s troops, who were brought from the west, so that he had a force of nearly 150,000 men. His object was to turn Lee’s right flank by pushing through the desolate region known as the ‘Wilderness,’ and thus to place the Union army between Lee’s forces and Richmond. This quickly resulted in a bloody contest, for Lee on the 4th of May learned Grant’s movement, immediately took the offensive, and marching eastward into the ‘Wilderness’ struck Grant’s advancing forces on the flank. The region was a difficult one to move in, being filled with scrub timber and in many places an impenetrable jungle. The battle began on the 5th and, each side being reinforced, was continued on the 6th.

      The fighting was almost exclusively with musketry, the nature of the ground making artillery useless. Grant’s numbers were at all points superior to Lee’s, and though the two days’ contest was generally regarded as a drawn battle Grant had secured the roads by which Lee was to pass out of the ‘Wilderness’ towards the southward, and after a day’s rest was able to resume the march towards Richmond. On the night of May 7 the Union army was put in motion towards Spottsylvania, a few miles to the south-eastward, moving in two columns. The advance was slow and difficult, being obstructed at all points by felled trees and constant skirmishes on front and flanks. Lee had evidently anticipated Grant’s movement, for he was pushing forward by a parallel road, and his advance had reached and was intrenched at Spottsylvania before Grant’s advance came up. Lee got his entire force in position there during the 8th, facing north and east. Both armies strengthened their positions on the 9th, and on the 10th Grant made a succession of attacks, losing about 5,000 men and being repulsed, the enemy having comparatively but small loss.

      The battle was renewed on the 11th and again on the 12th, when, before daybreak, General Hancock. stormed and captured Lee’s outer works with 4,000 prisoners. Lee, from his inner citadel, made five unsuccessful attempts to recapture this work. Grant in the meantime made repeated attacks upon Lee’s flanks, which were repulsed, and finding the enemy’s position practically unassailable, Grant during the next week gradually developed his left flank by withdrawing troops from the right under cover of the remainder of the army. By this movement Grant hoped to outflank the Confederates, but Lee discovered the process and made similar movements to meet it, moving at the same time on a somewhat shorter line. When, on May 23, the Union army arrived at the northern bank of the North Anna river the enemy were found posted on the southern bank. Hancock on the left, and Warren leading the Union right, crossed over, the latter being furiously assailed. Warren repulsed the assault with a loss of about 350, and took 1,000 prisoners. The Union flanks held their positions, but Lee prevented their centre from crossing, and Grant, seeing the danger of his position, determined to abandon it. On the night of May 26 the Union army was withdrawn and started by a wide circuit eastward and then southward towards the Pamunkey river, one of the affluents of the York river, Lee again making a similar movement by a shorter line. This series of ‘Battles of the Wilderness,’ continuing about three weeks, were the bloodiest of the war, Grant’s losses being 41,398, while no trustworthy report was made of Lee’s losses, which estimates place at 20,000.

      It was during this series of battles that Grant sent the despatch to the Government containing the famous sentence: ‘I propose to fight it out on this line if it takes all summer.’ After crossing the Pamunkey, Grant’s troops advanced to Cold Harbor, a few miles northward from Richmond, on the edge of the swamps of the Chickahominy СКАЧАТЬ