and material of a character much needed. Some twenty vessels were scuttled and destroyed; and of the fine fleet of boats that had sought refuge in the Yazoo river, not more than four or five were saved, which were up the Tallahatchie and Yellobusha.

THE BATTLE OF HELENA. THE TRANS-MISSISSIPPI.

The Vicksburg disaster was attended with a grave misfortune on the other side of the Mississippi: the repulse of the Confederates at Helena. Our army arrived within five miles of Helena on the evening of the 3d of July, when General Holmes assumed immediate command, detached Marmaduke's division and left Price but two brigades-McRae's Arkansians and Parsons' Missourians-with which he was ordered to assume position, assault and take what was known as the Graveyard Hill the next morning.

The route lay for the greater part of the way across abrupt hills and deep ravines, over which it was utterly impossible to move artillery during the darkness. General Price ordered his artillery to be left behind until daybreak, and moved forward with details from each battery accompanying the infantry, in order to command the guns which he expected to capture.

Within half a mile of the enemy's works, Price's troops were formed into two columns of divisions, Parsons' brigade occupying the right, moving in front. Both brigades moved forward rapidly, steadily, unflinching, and in perfect order under a storm of grape, canister, and minie balls, which were poured upon them not only from the Graveyard Hill in their front, but from the fortified hills upon the right and left, both of which were in easy range. The enemy gave way before the impetuous assault of the attacking columns, which entering the works almost simultaneously, planted the Confederate flag on the summit of the Graveyard Hill.

In the meantime, however, the attack of the enemy's works on Price's left, which was to have been made by General Fagan, had been repeatedly repulsed; although the men fought gallantry, and more than once drove the enemy from his rifle pits, under a heavy enfilading fire from one of the

enemy's strongest forts and a gunboat in front of the town. General Price had ordered McRae's brigade to reinforce Fagan; but it soon became obvious that it had been so much weakened by losses, and by the straggling of men overcome by thirst and the intense heat of the day, or disheartened by the failure of the other assaulting column, that it could not be detached without too greatly endangering General Price's own position. Under these circumstances, an order came from General Holmes to Price to withdraw his division. The attack was abandoned after a loss to the Confederates of about five or six hundred killed and wounded, and probably twice that number of prisoners.

But the result was important in other respects than that of the casualties of the fight. It, in connection with the fall of Vicksburg, terminated all hope of the connection of the TransMississippi with the eastern portions of the Confederacy, and was the first step of the retreat which, at last abandoning Little Rock, was to surrender into the hands of the enemy the most valuable portion of Arkansas.

It was supposed that the worst consequences of these events would be to estrange the Trans-Mississippi, and easily subject it to the arms or to the persuasions of the enemy. Never were fears of Confederate statesmen so little realized. They found in this distant section of the Confederacy a virtue which had been maintained under all disasters, and which should be commemorated here in a brief review of the history of this section.

The spirit of the Trans-Mississippi was most conspicuous and noble in view of the peculiar sufferings it had endured. It had made a proud record of patriotic integrity. In another volume we have seen how the Confederate forces, in anticipation of a grand contest near Corinth, were moved east of the Mississippi by order of General Albert Sidney Johnson, then commanding the Western Department. We may look back to that dark period. The Confederates took with them from Arkansas all material of war and public property, of every description. Immediately afterwards, Brigadier-general Pike retreated southward, to the vicinity of Red river. Thus Missouri was left hopeless of early succor, Arkansas without a soldier, and the Indian country undefended, except by its own inhabitants. A Federal force, five thousand strong, was organ

ized at Fort Scott, under the name of the "Indian expedition," and with the avowed intention to invade the Indian country and wrest it from our control. Hostile Indians began collecting on the border, and Federal emissaries were busy among the Cherokees and Creeks, inciting disaffection. Detachments of Federal cavalry penetrated, at will, into various parts of the upper half of Arkansas, plundering and burning houses, stealing horses and slaves, destroying farming utensils, murdering loyal men or carrying them into captivity, forcing the oath of allegiance on the timid, and disseminating disloyal sentiments among the ignorant. Tory bands were organized in many counties, not only in the upper, but in the lower half of the State likewise, and depredations and outrages upon loyal citizens were of constant occurrence. Straggling soldiers, belonging to distant commands, traversed the country, armed and lawless, robbing the people of their property, under the pretence of "impressing" it for the Confederate service. The governor and other executive officers fled from the capital, taking the archives with them. The courts were suspended, and civil magistrates almost universally ceased to exercise their functions. Confederate money was openly refused, or so depreciated as to be nearly worthless. This, with the short crop of the preceding year, and the failure, on all the uplands, of the one then growing, gave rise to the cruelest extortion in the necessaries of life, and menaced the poor with actual starvation.

But it was not only the omissions of the Richmond Administration of which the Trans-Mississippi had to complain. There were perpetrated upon it such positive outrages of the Confederate authority as had never been ventured or imagined in other portions of the country. The excesses of Major-general Hindman, who assumed, by a certain color of authority from Richmond, to be commanding-general of the Trans-Mississippi, had been severely censured by members of the Confederate Congress, and were the subject of an investigation in that body. They were such as might have moved any people from their allegiance, whose patriotism was not paramount to all other considerations. He suspended the civil authority, and instituted what he called "a government ad interim." In the summer of 1863, he had proclaimed martial law. To make

this declaration effective, a provost martial was appointed in each county, and all the independent companies therein were placed under his control. Over these were appointed provost marshals of districts which included several counties. The provost marshal general, at General Hindman's headquarters, had command over all.

Whatever may have been the good intentions or the palliative circumstances of this singular usurpation, it certainly could not be agreeable to a people accustomed to civil liberty; and it was an excrescence of the war, after the fashion of Yankee "vigor," which did serious dishonor to the Confederacy. We have referred to it here to illustrate the virtues of a people, whose steadfast patriotism could survive such trials.

As we have elsewhere seen, General Holmes assumed command of the Trans-Mississippi Department in the latter part of 1862. His operations had been feeble and unsuccessful. The fall of Vicksburg and the defeat at Helena, were irreparable disasters. Communication was interrupted between the two sections of the Confederacy, and each thrown on its own resources. It was supposed that this division of the efforts.of the Confederacy would tend to weakness and jealousies. But these fears were dismissed, when it was known that the governors of the States of the Trans Mississippi had made the recent disasters an occasion of official conference, in which they had taken the noble resolution to do their respective parts in the war, and to take care that the common cause of our independence should not suffer by a division of the efforts to obtain it. They declared that, instead of such division of effort being occasion of jealousy, it should be that of noble and patriotic rivalry.

It is not to be denied that it was unfortunate that the Eastern States and those of the Trans-Mississippi had been constrained to separate efforts in the war. But it was an especial subject of congratulation and pride that the spirit and unanimity of the South were unaffected by such an event, and that the most distant people of the Confederacy, not only faithfully kept, but fondly cherished their attachment to the vital principle of our struggle and the common cause of our arms.

CHAPTER IV.

Elasticity of the Spirit of the Confederacy.-What it Taught.-Decay of Confidence in President Davis's Administration.-His Affection for Pemberton.-A Season of Encouraging Events.-THE CAMPAIGN IN LOWER LOUISIANA.-Capture of Brashear City. The Affair of Donaldson.-THE SIEGE OF CHARLESTON.-Operations of the Enemy on Folly Island.--General Beauregard's Embarrassments-Assault of the Enemy of Fort Wagner.-His Foothold on Morris Island.--Beauregard's Designs.-Bombardment of Fort Wagner.-Second Repulse of the Enemy's Assault.-Gilmore's Insolent Demand.-His Attempt to Fire Charleston.--A Noble Reply from Beauregard.-Bombardment of Fort Sumter.-The Fort in Ruins.-Evacuation of Morris Island by the Confederates.-The Yankee Congratulations.-Devilish Penalties for "the Secession City."-Dahlgren's Part of the Programme.-His Night Attack on Sumter.--His Failure.-Safety of Charleston.-Bitterness of Yankee Disappointment. --MORGAN'S EXPEDITION INTO INDIANA AND OHIO.-His Capture of Lebanon.-An Unnatural Encounter.-Murder of Captain Magennis.-The Incursion Through Indiana. The Yankee Pursuit.-A Chaplain's Trick.-Operations in Ohio.-The Affair of Buffington Island.--Morgan's Attempt to Escape.-His Capture and Imprisonment.-Results of his Expedition, Strategic and Material.-The Value of Military Adventure.

THE most remarkable quality displayed by the Southern mind in this war has been its elasticity under reverse, its quick recovery from every impression of misfortune. This, more than any thing else, has attested the strength of our resolution to be free, and shown the utter insignificance of any peace party," or element of submission or compromise in the Confederacy. Great as were the disasters of Vicksburg and Gettysburg they were the occasions of no permanent depression of the public mind; and as the force of misfortune could scarcely, at any one time, be expected to exceed these events, it may be said they taught the lesson that the spirit of the Confederacy could not be conquered unless by some extremity close to annihilation. A few days after the events referred to President Davis took occasion, in a proclamation of pardon to deserters, to declare that a victorious peace, with proper exertions, was yet immediately within our grasp. Nor was he extravagant in this. The loss of territory which we had sustained, unaccompanied as it was by any considerable adhesion of its population to the enemy, though deplorable indeed, was not a