230

ADVANCE ON BOWLING GREEN.

CHAPTER IX.

EVENTS AT NASHVILLE, COLUMBUS, NEW MADRID, ISLAND NUMBER TEN, AND PEA RIDGE.

a Feb. 11,

HEN Fort Donelson fell, Kentucky and Missouri, and all of northern and middle Tennessee were lost to the Confederates, and the more Southern States, whose inhabitants expected to have the battles for their defense fought in the border Slave-labor States, were exposed to the inroads of the National armies.

The terror inspired all along the Confederate line by the fall of Fort Henry, and the forward movement of General Mitchel, of Buell's army, from his camp at Bacon's Creek, across the Green River at Mumfordsville, toward Bowling Green, simultaneously with Grant's investment of Fort Donelson," caused that line, which seemed so strong almost to invincibility a few weeks before, to crumble into fragments and suddenly disappear as a mist. General Johnston clearly perceived that both Bowling Green and Columbus were now untenable, and that the salvation of his troops at each required the immediate evacuation of these posts. He issued orders accordingly, and when Mitchel, having marched forty-two miles in thirty-two hours, reached the northern bank of the Barren River, on whose southern border Bowling Green' stood, the main

1862.

flames of the burning railway station-house, and Confederate stores in the

1 Bowling Green is about 74 miles from Nashville, and contained a little less than 3,000 inhabitants when the war broke out. Around it are numerous little hills or "knobs," on which the insurgents planted batteries and made the post very strong. Our litle picture shows the appearance of Bowling Green, in the vicinity of the railway station, on the day after the evacuation.

PANIC IN NASHVILLE.

231

center of the town. These had been fired by Texas Rangers, left behind for the purpose, and who were then just moving off on a railway train. Mitchel's troops were exhausted by their forced march in the keen frosty air, and the labor of removing trees from the roads which the Confederates had cut down; and the water in the stream being too high to ford, his army did not cross until the next day, when they found Bowling Green to be almost barren of spoils. Half a million dollars' worth of property had been destroyed, and only a brass 6-pounder, and commissary stores valued at five thousand dollars, remained. The Confederates had also removed, during the preceding four days, a large quantity of provisions and stores to Nashville.

Imminent danger now impended over Nashville. Johnston, as we have seen, had declared that he fought for that city at Fort Donelson. When the latter fell, Nashville was doomed, and its disloyal inhabitants were pale with

terror.

3

On the day of the surrender, the intelligence of the sad event reached the city just as the people were comfortably seated in the churches, for it was the Christian Sabbath. Pillow's foolish boast' and dispatch founded upon it' had allayed all fears; now these were awakened with ten-fold intensity. The churches were instantly emptied, and each citizen seemed to have no other thought but for personal safety. That the town would be speedily occupied by the Government troops, no one doubted. Grant's vigor had been tested. It had been observed that he did not stop when a victory was gained, but pushed forward to reap in full all of its advantages. So they gave up all as lost. The public stores were thrown wide open, and everybody was allowed to carry off provisions and clothing without hindrance.

The panic among the Secessionists was fearful. Governor Harris, the worst criminal of them all, was crazy with alarm. He rode through the streets with his horse at full speed, crying out that the papers in the capital must be removed. He well knew what evidence of his treason was among them. He and his guilty legislature gathered as many of the archives as possible, and fled by railway to Memphis,' while the officers of banks, bear

1 See page 216. This boast had so assured the citizens that all was safe, that they felt no apprehensions of evil. Indeed, they had indulged in rejoicings over the victory of the Confederates at Fort Donelson. For this reason, the astounding news that now reached them was more appalling.

2 The dispatch was headed in large letters-ENEMY RETREATING!-GLORIOUS RESULT!!--OUR BOYS FOLLOWING AND PEPPERING THEIR REAR!!-A COMPLETE VICTORY!!

"An earthquake," says Pollard (i. 247), “could not have shocked the city more. The congregations at the churches were broken up in confusion and dismay; women and children rushed into the streets, wailing with terror; trunks were thrown from three-story windows in the haste of the fugitives, and thousands hastened to leave their beautiful city in the midst of the most distressing scenes of terror, confusion, and plundering by the mob."

The panic of the people was natural. They had been deceived and misled, by false teachers in their midst, into the belief that the people of the North were half savages. Among these teachers, who should be held responsible for much of the sufferings inflicted by the war, was W. E. Ward, a clergyman who, in his paper, called The Banner of Peace, published at Nashville, had just said: "We have felt too secure, we have been too blind to the consequence of Federal success. If they succeed, we shall see plunder, insult to old and young, male and female, murder of innocents, release of slaves, and causing them to drive and insult their masters and mistresses in the most menial services, the land laid waste, houses burned, banks and private coffers robbed, cotton and every valuable taken away before our eyes, and a brutal, drunken soldiery turned loose upon us. Who wants to see this? If you do not believe, you will see it; look at Missouri.”

Nashville correspondent of the Richmond Dispatch, Feb. 17, 1862.

At Memphis, on the 19th, Governor Harris issued a proclamation, in which he deplored the loss of Fort Donelson, and the danger that threatened the capital, and told the people that henceforth Tennessee was to become the battle-field in which her inhabitants would show to the world that they were worthy to be-weat they had solemnly declared themselves to be-"freemen." He encouraged, or discouraged them by the announcement that he would take the field at their head; and then in turgid phrases he tried to arouse them

232

DESTRUCTION OF THE TENNESSEE IRON WORKS.

ing away specie from the vaults, and citizens encumbered with their most valuable effects that were portable, crowded the stations of the railways leading to Decatur and to Chattanooga. Every vehicle was brought into requisition, and hack-hire was raised to twenty-five dollars an hour. This fearful panic was increased when a portion of the troops, flying from Bowling Green, came rushing into the city across the railway and the Suspension bridges, and a rumor spread over the town that the victors at Fort Donelson were making their way rapidly up the Cumberland.

a Feb. 16, 1862.

The rumor was true. On the evening of the day after the surrender of Fort Donelson, Commodore Foote sent the St. Louis up the Cumberland to the Tennessee Iron Works, six or seven miles above Dover. These belonged, in part, to John Bell, the candidate of the "Constitutional Union Party" for President, in 1860,' who, as we have observed, had early espoused the cause of the conspirators.' There appeared to be sufficient evidence of these works having been employed in the interest of the rebellion to warrant their destruction, and they were laid in ashes. Nothing remained of them, when the writer passed by the spot in the spring of 1866, but three tall chimneys, ruined machinery, and heaps of brick.

On the 19th, the commodore, with the gun-boats Cairo, Lieutenant-commanding Bryant, and Conestoga, Lieutenant-commanding Phelps, ascended

the river to Clarkesville (a city on its right bank, of about two thousand inhabitants before the war, and the capital of Montgomery County), with the intention of attacking an unfinished fort there, which the Confederates

to resist the Union armies. He had, he said, in a message to the Legislature on the 20th, organized and put into the field since May, 1861, "for the Confederate service, fifty-nine regiments of infantry, one of cavalry, eleven cavalry battalions, and over twenty independent companies, mostly of artillery." Fifteen thousand of these troops, he said, had been armed by the "Confederate Government," and to arm the remainder he called for "the sporting guns" of the citizens.

1 See page 30, volume I.

2 See page 374, volume I.

The National troops completed the work and named it Fort Bruce, in honor of the loyal Colonel Bruce, of Nashville. The engraving shows its situation at the bend of the Cumberland, about half a mile below Clarksville. It commanded the river up and down. The mouth of the Red River is seen at the center of the picture, near a storehouse. On the Clarksville side of that stream was a small redoubt, called the Mud Fort, it being overflowed and covered with sediment at high water. This sketch was made by the writer from the deck of the Emma Floyd, while lying at Clarksville, looking down the river.

FLIGHT OF CONFEDERATES FROM NASHVILLE.

233

were erecting on the high bluff at the mouth of the Red River, a small stream that enters the Cumberland just below the town. The garrison, startled by the general panic, fled, and, in defiance of the wishes and remonstrances of the citizens of Clarkesville, set fire to the fine railway bridge that spanned the river at that place. Colonel Webster, Grant's chief of staff, and Lieutenant Phelps, immediately went ashore and hoisted the National flag over the fort. Two-thirds of the terrified citizens of Clarkesville had fled when Foote arrived. At the suggestion of the late venerable Cave Johnson, and one or two others, he proclaimed full protection to all peaceable citizens, at the same time warning them not to display any secession flags or other evidence of rebellious feeling.

General Smith, with the advance of the National army, marched up to Clarkesville and took command there; while Foote returned to Cairo for more gun-boats, for the purpose of attacking Nashville. In the mean time General Johnston and his forces from Bowling Green had continued their flight southward as far as Murfreesboro, twenty-five miles on the way toward Chattanooga,' leaving General Floyd, the fugitive from Fort Donelson, with a few troops to secure the immense amount of stores and provisions in Nashville. Pillow, the other fugitive from Fort Donelson, and Hardee, who had come down from Bowling Green, were directed to assist Floyd in the business. The assignment to the perilous duty of remaining nearest the dreaded Nationals seemed like punishment inflicted on Floyd and Pillow by Johnston for their cowardice. If so, it was successful; yet it was injurious to the Confederate cause, for these men, unwilling to risk their persons again, suffered terribly from fear, and counseled flight, as before. Floyd, on hearing that Foote's gun-boats were coming, gave orders on Monday for the Confederate stores to be thrown open to the public; two steam-packets,

which were being changed into gunboats, to be burned; and the two bridges at Nashville to be destroyed. Against the last act the citizens most vehement

ly protested, and it was postponed until Tuesday night, when they were both burned by Floyd's order; and he and. Pillow literally scampered away southward by

NASHVILLE AND ITS BRIDGES

a Feb. 17,

1862

1 It was supposed by the Confederates that the Nationals would push on toward East Tennessee, and it was for the purpose of confronting such movement that Johnston took position at Murfreesboro.

2 The wire suspension-bridge was a beautiful structure, and cost about $150,000. A large portion of the stock belonged to the slain General Zollicoffer, and was the chief reliance for support, of his orphaned daughters. But Floyd and Pillow wished to put a gulf between themselves and the Nationals, that they might save their own worthless persons; and so the claims of orphans and the prayers of citizens were of no avail

234

SURRENDER OF NASHVILLE.

the light of the conflagration.' The troops that remained longest in Nashville were Forest's cavalry, led by that brave captain.

During the remainder of the week, Nashville was the theater of the wildest anarchy, and neither public nor private property was safe for an hour. Happily for the well-disposed inhabitants, Colonel Kenner, of the Fourth Ohio cavalry, of Mitchel's division, entered the city on Sunday evening, the 23d, and endeavored to restore order. He was immediately followed by the remainder of his commander's force, who encamped at Edgefield, opposite Nashville, and there awaited the arrival of General Buell. That officer came on the 25th, and on the same morning the Conestoga arrived from Clarkesville, as a convoy to transports bearing a considerable body of troops, under General Nelson. These had not been opposed in their passage up the river, for the only battery on its banks between the two cities was Fort Zollicoffer, on a bluff, four or five miles below Nashville, which was unfinished, and was then abandoned. The citizens of Nashville, believing General Johnston would make a stand there, had commenced this fort on the south or left bank of the Cumberland, and were much incensed by its sudden abandonment.

Pursuant to previous arrangement, the mayor of Nashville (R. B. Cheatham) and a small delegation of citizens crossed over to Buell's quarters at

1862.

Edgefield, and there made a formal surrender of the city." GenFeb. 26, eral Buell at once issued an order congratulating the troops "that it had been their privilege to restore the National banner to the Capitol of Tennessee." He expressed a belief that the hearts of a greater portion of the people of that State would be rejoiced by the fact;

1 A greater portion of the cannon at Nashville were spiked, and many of them were placed upon the bridges before they were fired, and when these perished in the flames, the cannon went to the bottom of the Cumberland.

2 The Capitol of the State of Tennessee is one of the finest of its kind in the United States. It is in the center of four acres of ground in the midst of the city, and crowns a hill that rises 197 feet above the Cumberland River. It is composed of fossilated. limestone, taken from quarries near the city, and its style is of the most beautiful of the Grecian orders, with four porticoes, whose columns are 33 feet in height. It is a parallelogram in form, 140 by 270 feet in size, and is surrounded by a terrace 17 feet in width and six in height. The pinnacle