Grant Moves South (78 page)

1
.

O. R., Vol. X, Part One: Report of John A. Rawlins, p. 184; General Buell's report, p. 291; Halleck's telegram to Grant, April 5, O. R., Vol. X, Part Two, p. 94; statement of William I. Cherry to Lloyd Lewis, June 29, 1939, in the Lloyd Lewis Papers; Ms. letter,
Mrs. William H. Cherry to the Reverend T. M. Hurst of Arnot, Pa., dated Dec. 6, 1892, also in the Lloyd Lewis Papers.

2
.

O. R., Vol. X, Part Two, p. 95; Vol. LII, Part One, p. 232.

3
.

O. R., Vol. X, Part One, McPherson's report, p. 181; Grant to Halleck, Vol. X, Part Two, p. 94.

4
.

O. R., Vol. X, Part One, Rawlins's report, p. 185; Grant's Memoirs, Vol. I, p. 336. In 1896, in a letter to James Grant Wilson, Wallace described the meeting, saying that Grant seemed mildly puzzled and that Grant's last word to him was to “hold yourself in readiness to move in any direction.” (Letter in the Palmer Collection, Western Reserve Historical Society, Cleveland.)

5
.

Badeau, Vol. I, p. 79; John K. Duke,
History of the 53rd Regiment Ohio Volunteer Infantry
, p. 49; O. R., Vol. X, Part One, p. 185.

6
.

William W. Belknap,
History of the 15th Iowa Veteran Infantry
, pp. 189–190.

7
.

O. R., Vol. X, Part One, pp. 181, 568; M. F. Force,
From Fort Henry to Corinth
, pp. 122–124.

8
.

History of the 53rd Regiment Ohio Volunteer Infantry
, as Note 5, pp. 27, 46; T. J. Lindsey,
Ohio at Shiloh: Report of the Commission
, pp. 37–38; O. R., Vol. X, Part One, pp. 264–265; Henry H. Wright,
History of the Sixth Iowa Infantry
, p. 80;
History of the 15th Iowa
, p. 83.

9
.

O. R., Vol. X, Part One, p. 133.

10
.

Lieutenant S. D. Thompson,
Recollections with the Third Iowa
, p. 214; Warren Olney,
Shiloh as Seen by a Common Soldier
, in War Paper No. 5, California Commandery, Military Order of the Loyal Legion of the United States, p. 6 ff.

11
.

Richard Miller Devens,
The Pictorial Book of Anecdotes and Incidents of the War of the Rebellion
, p. 253; Badeau, Vol. I, p. 79; Grant's account of Shiloh in
B. & L.
, Vol. I, p. 473.

12
.

O. R., Vol. X, Part One, p. 278;
Sketches of War History: Papers prepared for the Ohio Commandery, Military Order of the Loyal Legion of the United States
, Vol. V, pp. 431–432.

13
.

Samuel H. Fletcher,
History of Company A, Second Illinois Cavalry
, pp. 49–52.

14
.

O. R., Vol. LII, Part One, pp. 232–233.

15
.

Lieutenant Colonel Douglas Putnam, in
Sketches of War History
, Vol. III, p. 199; Sergeant Alexander Downing,
Downing's Civil War Diary
, pp. 41–42.

16
.

Interview with Hillyer,
Chicago Tribune
, January 27, 1869.

17
.

O. R., Vol. X, Part One, p. 119.

18
.

O. R., Vol. X, Part One, p. 288; F. Y. Hedley,
Marching Through Georgia;
Gen. Edward Bouton,
Events of the Civil War
, p. 31;
The Story of the 55th Regiment Illinois Volunteer Infantry
, by a committee.

19
.

John R. Rerick,
The 44th Indiana Volunteers in the Rebellion
, p. 231.

20
.

Chaplain Marion Morrison,
History of the 9th Regiment Illinois Volunteer Infantry;
O. R., Vol. X, Part One, pp. 203, 245; pamphlet,
Ninth Reunion of Iowa Hornets' Nest Brigade
, held at Pittsburg Landing, April 6 and 7, 1912, p. 13; Warren Olney,
Shiloh as Seen by a Common Soldier
, as Note 10.

21
.

Grant's Memoirs, Vol. I, p. 340; A. L. Chetlain, quoted in
Chicago Inter-Ocean
, May 10, 1881; Chetlain,
Recollections of Seventy Years
, pp. 88–89.

22
.

O. R., Vol. X, Part One, pp. 186, 259, 263.

23
.

In his coldly savage criticism of Grant's actions at Shiloh (
B. & L
., Vol. I, pp. 486–536), General Buell remarks that Grant is very seldom seen in reports of the April 6 fight, and implies broadly that the army commander was very inert. Actually, there are few Civil War battles in which one gets so many glimpses of a commanding general going about his business energetically and competently. Colonel J. F. C. Fuller has cited 18 separate movements and actions which Grant carried out in a space of nine hours, and concludes that “during the turmoil, his activity and generalship appear to me, in the circumstances which surrounded him, to have been quite wonderful.” (
The Generalship of Ulysses S. Grant
, pp. 111–113.) For another discussion of Grant's activities on April 6, reaching a similar conclusion, see Conger, pp. 243–251.

24
.

O. R., Vol. X, Part One, pp. 130–131, 161–162, 226–227; Belknap, pp. 189–190.

25
.

Rawlins's original account of the meeting is given in his Shiloh report, O. R., Vol. X, Part One, p. 186. A slightly more elaborate version, probably derived from Rawlins himself, is given in Wilson's “Life of John A. Rawlins,” p. 88. In his account of Shiloh printed in
B. & L.
, Buell flatly asserts that nothing whatever was said about surrender, and depicts Grant as a rather frightened and stupid man. (Vol. I, pp. 492–493.) Grant refers to the meeting in his Memoirs, Vol. I, pp. 344–345.

26
.

John K. Duke,
History of the 53rd Regiment Ohio Volunteer Infantry
, pp. 39–55; Lieutenant Colonel Douglas Putnam in Vol. III,
Sketches of War History
, p. 202.

27
.

O. R., Vol. X, Part One, p. 149; John T. Bell,
Tramps and Triumphs of the Second Iowa Infantry
, p. 8.

28
.

O. R., Vol. X, Part One, pp. 277–278, 562.

29
.

B. & L.
, Vol. I, pp. 590, 599–601; O. R., Vol. X, Part One, p. 464.

30
.

Lieutenant Colonel Douglas Putnam, as Note 26; Whitelaw Reid,
Ohio in the War
, Vol. I, p. 375.

31
.

Whitelaw Reid, in an address at a testimonial dinner to Grant at the Lotus Club, New York, reported in the
Chicago Tribune
, Nov. 21, 1880. When he copied this report for future use, Lloyd Lewis added his own caustic comment: “Reid lies like a dog, for it was he who spread blame on Grant for Shiloh's massacre.” A slightly different
version is given by Reid in
Ohio in the War
, Vol. I, p. 375.

32
.

Wilbur F. Hinman,
The Story of the Sherman Brigade;
Sergt. N. V. Brower,
The Battle of Shiloh
, at the 5th annual reunion of the 9th Illinois Regiment Veteran Volunteer Association, 1888, p. 58; William R. Hartpence,
History of the 51st Indiana Veteran Volunteer Infantry
, pp. 36–37; O. R., Vol. X, Part One, p. 331.

33
.

O. R., Vol. X, Part One, p. 333.

34
.

John Beatty,
The Citizen Soldier
, p. 161;
History of the 51st Indiana Veteran Volunteer Infantry
, p. 38.

35
.

G. T. Beauregard, “The Shiloh Campaign,” in the
North American Review
for February, 1886.

36
.

Colonel William H. Heath, “Hours with Grant,” in the
National Tribune
, June 29, 1916; O. R., Vol. X, Part One, p. 339.

37
.

Edwin Witherby Brown, “Reminiscences of an Ohio Volunteer,” in
Ohio Archaeological and Historical Quarterly
, Vol. 48, p. 311; Henry H. Wright,
History of the Sixth Iowa Infantry
, p. 86, 89–90; Captain James G. Day.
The 15th Iowa at Shiloh
, in Vol. II,
War Sketches and Incidents
, published by the Iowa Commandery, Military Order of the Loyal Legion of the United States, p. 186.

38
.

Charles F. Hubert,
History of the 50th Regiment Illinois Volunteer Infantry
, p. 93; Lieutenant Colonel Douglas Putnam, in Vol. III,
Sketches of War History
, p. 205.

39
.

Grant voiced sharp criticism of Wallace when he wrote of Shiloh, but modified his criticism materially in his Memoirs, Vol. I, pp. 351–352. Accounts by Rowley, McPherson and Rawlins of the various efforts to get Wallace's division to the battlefield are in O. R., Vol. X, Part One, pp. 178–182, 185–188. Wallace's own report on Shiloh is in that volume, beginning p. 169. Wallace gives a detailed and convincing justification of his course of action in his letter to James Grant Wilson, Western Reserve Historical Society, as Note 4.

40
.

O. R., Vol. X, Part One, p. 159; Grant's Memoirs, Vol. I, p. 349.

41
.

Interview with Sherman in the
Washington Post
, quoted in the
Army and Navy Journal
for December 30, 1893.

1
.

George W. Cable, in
B. & L.
, Vol. II, p. 18; Charles Wright,
A Corporal's Story;
Beauregard, “The Campaign of Shiloh,” in
B. & L.
, Vol. I, p. 592.

2
.

Beauregard, as Note 1; C. C. Briant,
History of the Sixth Indiana Infantry
, pp. 102–103; Grant's Memoirs, Vol. I, p. 350.

3
.

Lew Wallace: An Autobiography
, Vol. II, pp. 544–545.

4
.

Wallace,
Autobiography
, p. 524

5
.

Brigadier General Thomas Jordan, “Notes of a Confederate Staff
Officer at Shiloh,” in
B. &
L.
, Vol. I, p. 603; Grant's Memoirs, Vol. I, pp. 350–351. This is probably the basis for the totally false legend that Grant in person led a final victorious charge at Shiloh.

6
.

O. R., Vol. X, Part Two, pp. 94, 96–97. See also Grant's remarks in his Memoirs, Vol. I, pp. 354–355.

7
.

O. R., Vol. X, Part Two, pp. 97–98.

8
.

Bragg to Beauregard, O. R., Vol. X, Part Two, pp. 398, 400.

9
.

O. R., Vol. X, Part Two, p. 97.

10
.

The point is well made by Thomas B. Van Home in his
History of the Army of the Cumberland
, Vol. I, p. 119; “Perhaps no battle of the war was projected with greater objects than that of Shiloh. The aims were to crush, first, Grant, then Buell, and then take the offensive throughout the west. But the magnitude of the interests involved did not find correspondence in the strength of the army gathered at Corinth, and the initial movement of the grand scheme was undertaken too late to succeed.… A grand plan there failed through inadequate resources and comparative feebleness of execution.”

11
.

Badeau, Vol. I, pp. 597–598. Beauregard's note to Grant is most curiously worded. It begins: “At the close of the conflict yesterday, my forces being exhausted by the extraordinary length of time during which they were engaged with yours … and it being apparent that you had received and were still receiving reinforcements, I felt it my duty to remove my troops.” It almost sounds as if Beauregard were offering Grant the explanation which was due to Jefferson Davis; according to a newspaperman who was then at Federal headquarters, Grant chuckled over it, and said he was tempted to reply that no apologies were necessary. (Richardson, p. 255.)

12
.

Downing's Civil War Diary
, p. 43;
History of the 51st Indiana Veteran Volunteer Infantry
, p. 43.

13
.

A
GATE
(Whitelaw Reid) in the
Cincinnati Commercial
, April 15; O. R., Vol. X, Part Two: Grant's Order, p. 100; Halleck to Grant, p. 99.

14
.

O. R., Vol. X, Part Two, pp. 109, 130.

15
.

The original of this letter is in the De Coppet Collection at the Princeton University Library.

16
.

O. R., Vol. X, Part Two: Halleck to Stanton, p. 98; to Pope, pp. 107–108.

17
.

O. R., Vol. X, Part Two, p. 99.

18
.

O. R., Vol. X, Part Two: General Orders No. 16, p. 105; Halleck to Grant, April 13, pp. 105–106.

19
.

Letter of W. C. Carroll to Congressman Washburne, dated December 24, 1862, in the Washburne Papers. Carroll had been invited that spring to serve on the staff of John A. Logan, had gone upstream to Savannah to wait for Logan, and while waiting had formed a temporary connection with Grant. When he wrote to Washburne, eight months later, he was asking for help to get an appointment as
an aide to one of the major generals in the Regular Army, and he recited his feat in writing the story about Shiloh to show that his was a deserving case.

20
.

New York Herald
, April 10, 1862; Emmet Crozier,
Yankee Reporters
, p. 217.

21
.

New York Herald
, April 16, 1862; for Sherman's comment, see his letter to Grant dated Sept. 10, 1884, in the Sherman Letter Book. The Crozier book mentioned in Note 20 (hereafter cited as Crozier) has a very good account of the way Reid got and wrote his story, pp. 210–217.

22
.

Sherman, Fighting Prophet
, pp. 233–234;
Chicago Times
, May 6, 1862;
Cincinnati Commercial
, April 25, 1862;
New York Herald
, April 22; F. W. Keil,
The Thirty-fifth Ohio Regiment
, p. 64.

23
.

Capt. W. Irving Hodgson, C. S. A., of the Washington Artillery, wrote that his battery opened fire at 7:10
A
.
M
.—approximately two hours after the first clash between Prentiss's and Hardee's advance patrols—“on the first camp attacked and taken by our army”—and said that Confederate infantry stormed and occupied this camp only after his guns had silenced two Union batteries. Colonel Daniel W. Adams of the 1st Louisiana Infantry, which was in the column that attacked Prentiss's camp, said Federal resistance was so stiff that he feared for a time his brigade would have to retreat. General Hardee said that his skirmishers were attacked at dawn, that “in half an hour the battle became fierce,” and that Cleburne's brigade, “after a series of desperate charges,” was driven back, entering “the enemy's encampments” only after a second line came up to its support. For these and other Confederate reports bearing on the fight for the camps, see O. R., Vol. X, Part One, pp. 513, 514, 532, 536, 541, 548, 568 ff., 573, 581. The report of Sherman's 53rd Ohio (same, p. 264) one of the Union regiments most prominently involved in the rout, shows the 53rd in line and ready for action “shortly after daybreak.” After some time it was moved to a new position directly in the rear of the camp, at which time Confederate skirmishers appeared on the opposite side of the camp. Still later a Confederate line of battle came up behind the skirmishers, and the Ohioans got off two volleys before their colonel bolted—after which the regiment disintegrated. Major D. W. Reed, historian of the postwar National Shiloh Commission, says the opening shots were fired at 4:55
A
.
M
., and estimates that more than four hours fighting occurred before Premiss's camp was taken. See
Ohio at Shiloh: Report of the Commission
, by T. J. Lindsay, pp. 79–80.

24
.

New York Herald
, May 3, 1862. Grant almost certainly was driven to write this letter by the fact that Julia, then in Covington, Kentucky, was reading the bitter attacks on him which were appearing in the Cincinnati newspapers.

25
.

The Sherman Letters: Correspondence between General and Senator
Sherman from 1831 to 1891
, edited by Rachael Sherman Thorndike, pp. 143–145. See also letter of Gen. Sherman to Senator Sherman dated May 12, 1862, in the Sherman Papers. After the war Sherman wrote furiously: “The truth is that Buell took no part in the battle of April 6, 1862, which was the Battle of Shiloh. He came on the field grudgingly and actually held back Nelson's division at Savannah after Grant had ordered it forward. Had Wallace and Nelson come on the Field as they might have done by noon, we could have assumed the offensive and recovered all the ground lost—we lost ground, nothing else—for at night the Rebs were as much beaten as we were.” (Letter of April 12, 1886, to “Dear Moulton,” in the Sherman Papers at the Huntington Library.)

26
.

Rowley to E. Hempstead, April 19, 1862; Rowley to Washburne, April 23; J. E. Smith to Washburne, May 16; all in the Washburne papers. Ammen's diary entry, which does not appear in the portion printed in the Official Records, is in his original manuscript in the Illinois State Historical Library. Clyde C. Walton, Illinois State Historian, writes: “We have no reason to assume that the diary was not written at the time of the battle of Shiloh. I suspect that it was written from notes kept day by day from the battle and put in the book possibly beginning April 8.” The interesting point here, of course, is that Ammen wrote this testimonial to Grant's sobriety before any accusation of intoxication at Shiloh had been publicly made. On May 20, 1862, General N. J. T. Dana wrote to his brother: “As to Gen. Grant's intemperance, it is pure fiction and slander … I hope my testimony on this will be conclusive with those who know me.” (Ms. letter in the Huntington Library.)

According to Walter Q. Gresham, then Colonel of the 53rd Indiana, who commanded the post of Savannah before and during the battle, Rawlins asked every officer who had had contact with Grant to write a statement covering every occasion on which he had seen Grant during the 10 days previous to and including the day of the battle. Colonel Gresham said that he himself had seen Grant at all hours of the day and night during that time and never saw the slightest sign that the man had been using intoxicants. (
The Life of Walter Quintin Gresham
, by Matilda Gresham, Vol. I, p. 182.) If Rawlins did make such a collection, it is not in the National Archives today. A search made there in the winter of 1959 revealed only a letter of inquiry written in 1909 by Colonel Gresham's son, Otto Gresham, who sought to find the report which the colonel had made.

27
.

James Grant Wilson,
The Life and Campaigns of General Grant
, p. 37.

28
.

Letter of Julia Grant to E. B. Washburne, May 16, 1862, in the Grant Papers, Illinois State Historical Library.

29
.

Letter of Joseph Medill to Washburne, May 24, 1862, in the Washburne Papers.

30
.

O. R., Vol. X, Part One, p. 99.

31
.

Letter of Grant to “E. B. Washburn” May 14, 1862, in the Washburne Papers. This letter, incidentally, shows how Grant's carelessness about spelling extended even to his method of writing Washburne's name in his letters. As often as not Grant would omit the final “e.”

32
.

Col. Chetlain, who was in a position to know the headquarters opinion of the battle, wrote (in
Recollections of Seventy Years
, p. 89) that Grant's staff officers always believed that if Lew Wallace's division had come promptly into action when ordered the battle would have been won by midafternoon of April 6. This belief is of course debatable, but it apparently was the basis for the position Grant took in his letter to Washburne.