1862]

THE DEMORALIZED REMNANT OF HIS FORCES.

63

"My brigade was ordered to change direction again, face toward Pittsburg, where the enemy appeared to have made his last stand, and to advance upon him, General Chalmers's brigade being again on my right, and extending to the swamp of the Tennessee River. Without ammunition, and with only their bayonets to rely on, steadily my men advanced under a heavy fire from light batteries, siege-pieces, and gunboats. Passing through the ravine, they arrived near the crest of the opposite hill, upon which the enemy's batteries were, but could not be urged farther without support. Sheltering themselves against the precipitous sides of the ravine, they remained under this fire for some time. Finding an advance without support impracticable, remaining there under fire useless, and believing that any further forward movement should have been made simultaneously along our whole line, I proceeded to obtain orders from General Withers, but, after seeing him, was ordered by a staff-officer to retire. This order was communicated to me as coming from General Beauregard."

General Hardee, who commanded the first line, says in his

report:

"Upon the death of General Johnston, the command having devolved upon General Beauregard, the conflict was continued until near sunset, and the advance divisions were within a few hundred yards of Pittsburg, where the enemy were huddled in confusion, when the order to withdraw was received. The troops were ordered to bivouac on the field of battle."

General Polk's report says:

"We had one hour or more of daylight still left, were within one hundred and fifty to four hundred yards of the enemy's position, and nothing seemed wanting to complete the most brilliant victory of the war but to press forward and make a vigorous assault on the demoralized remnant of his forces."

General Gilmer, the chief engineer of the Confederate States Army, in a letter to Colonel William Preston Johnston, dated September 17, 1872, writes as follows:

vived the day he would have crushed and captured General Grant's "It is my well-considered opinion that if your father had sur

army before the setting of the sun on the 6th. In fact, at the time your father received the mortal wound, advancing with General Breckinridge's command, the day was ours. The enemy having lost all the strong positions on that memorable field, his troops fell back in great disorder on the banks of the Tennessee. To cover the confusion, rapid fires were opened from the gunboats the enemy had placed in the river; but the shots passed entirely over our devoted men, who were exultant and eager to be led forward to the final assault, which must have resulted in a complete victory, owing to the confusion and general disorganization of the Federal troops. I knew the condition of General Grant's army at the moment, as I had reached a high, projecting point on the bank of the river, about a mile above Pittsburg Landing, and could see the hurried movements to get the disordered troops across to the right bank. Several thousand had already passed, and a confused mass of men crowded to the landing to get on the boats that were employed in crossing. I rode rapidly to General Bragg's position to report what I had seen, and suggested that, if he would suspend the fire of his artillery and marshal his infantry for a general advance, the enemy must surrender. General Bragg decided to make the advance, and authorized me and other officers to direct the commanders of the batteries to cease firing.

"In the midst of the preparations, orders reached General Bragg from General Beauregard directing the troops to be withdrawn and placed in camp for the night-the intention being to resume the contest in the morning. This was fatal, as it enabled General Buell and General Wallace to arrive on the scene of action; that is, they came up in the course of the night. Had General Beauregard known the condition of the enemy as your father knew it when he received the fatal shot, the order for withdrawal would certainly not have been given, and, without such order, I know the enemy would have been crushed."*

To General Gilmer's opinion as a scientific engineer, a soldier of long experience, and a man of resolute will as well as calm judgment, the greatest respect will be accorded by those who knew him in the United States Army, as well as his associates in the Confederate Army.

General Bragg, in his official report, says:

"The Life of Gen. Albert Sidney Johnston," pp. 635, 636.

1862

CONDITION OF THE TWO ARMIES.

65

"As soon as our troops could be again put in motion, the order was given to move forward at all points and sweep the enemy from the field. . . . Our troops, greatly exhausted by twelve hours' incessant fighting without food, mostly responded to the order with alacrity, and the movement commenced with every prospect of success, though a heavy battery in our front and the gunboats on our right seemed determined to dispute every inch of ground. Just at this time an order was received from the commanding General to withdraw the forces beyond the enemy's fire."

In addition to the statements and opinions cited above, I will introduce from a recent publication by Thomas Worthington, late colonel of the Forty-sixth Regiment of Ohio Volunteers, two statements showing the relative condition of the two armies in the afternoon of the day of battle. It may be proper to say that Colonel Worthington was regularly educated as a soldier, and had seen service in Mexico.

He quotes Colonel Geddes, of the Eighth Iowa Volunteers, as follows:

"About 3 P. M. all communications with the river (landing) ceased, and it became evident to me that the enemy was turning the right and left flanks of our army. . . . About 2 P. M. the whole Union right, comprising the Forty-sixth Ohio, which had held that flank two hours or more, was driven back in disorder, and the Confederate flanking force cut the center off from the landing, as stated by Colonel Geddes, soon after General John

ston's fall."

General Beauregard reports as follows:

“It was after 6 P. M. when the enemy's last position was carried, and his force finally broke and sought refuge behind a commanding eminence covering Pittsburg Landing, not more than half a mile distant, and under the guns of the gunboats, which opened on our eager columns a fierce and annoying fire with shot and shell of the heaviest description. Darkness was close at hand. Officers and men were exhausted by a combat of over twelve hours, without food, and jaded by the march of the preceding day through mud and water; it was, therefore, impossible to col

lect the rich and opportune spoils of war scattered broadcast on the field left in our possession, and impracticable to make any effective dispositions for their removal to the rear.

"I accordingly established my headquarters at the church of Shiloh, in the enemy's encampment, with Major-General Bragg, and directed our troops to sleep on their arms in such positions in advance and rear as corps commanders should determine, hoping, from news received by a special dispatch, that delays had been encountered by General Buell in his march from Columbia, and that his main forces, therefore, could not reach the field of battle in time to save General Grant's shattered fugitives from capture or destruction on the following day.

Such are the representations of those having the best means of information relative to the immediate causes of the failure to drive the enemy from his last foothold, and gain possession of it. Some of the more remote causes of this failure may be noticed. The first was the death of General Johnston, which is thus described by his son:

"General Johnston had passed through the ordeal (the charge upon the enemy) seemingly unhurt. His noble horse was shot in four places; his clothes were pierced by missiles; his boot-sole was cut and torn by a Minié ball; but, if he himself had received any severe wound, he did not know it. At this moment Governor Harris rode up from the right, elated with his own success, and with the vindication of his Tennesseeans. After a few words, General Johnston sent him with an order to Colonel Statham, which, having delivered, he speedily returned. In the mean time knots and groups of Federal soldiers kept up an angry discharge of firearms as they retreated upon their supports, and their last line, now yielding, delivered volley after volley as they retreated. By the chance of war a Minié ball from one of these did its fatal work. As General Johnston, on horseback, sat there, knowing that he had crushed in the arch which had so long resisted the pressure of his forces, and waiting until they could collect sufficiently to give the final stroke, he received a mortal wound. It came in the moment of victory and triumph from a flying foe. It smote him at instant when he felt the full conviction

the very

won."

that the day was

1862]

FELL IN SIGHT OF VICTORY.

67

His wound consisted in the cutting of the artery that runs down through the thigh and divides at the knee, and passes along the separate bones of the lower part of the leg. The wound was just above the division or branch of the artery. It was fatal only because the flow of blood was not stopped by a tourniquet. The narrative continues:

"General Beauregard had told General Johnston that morning as he rode off, that if it should be necessary to communicate with him or for him to do anything, he would be found in his ambulance in bed. Governor Harris, knowing this, and how feeble General Beauregard's health was, went first to his headquarters-just in the rear of where the army had deployed into line the evening before. Beauregard and his staff were gone on horseback in the direction of Shiloh Church. He found them there. The Governor told General Beauregard that General Johnston had been killed. Beauregard expressed regret, and then remarked, 'Everything else seems to be going on well on the right.' Governor Harris assented. Then,' said Beauregard, 'the battle may as well go on.' The Governor replied that he certainly thought it ought. He offered his services to Beauregard, and they were courteously accepted. General Beauregard then remained where he was, waiting the issue of events." *

Sidney Johnston fell in sight of victory; the hour he had waited for, the event he had planned for, had arrived. His fame was vindicated, but far dearer than this to his patriotic spirit was it with his dying eyes to behold his country's flag, so lately drooping in disaster, triumphantly advancing. In his fall the great pillar of the Southern Confederacy was crushed, and beneath its fragments the best hope of the Southwest lay buried. A highly educated and richly endowed soldier, his varied experience embraced also civil affairs, and his intimate knowledge of the country and people of the Southwest so highly qualified him for that special command that it was not possible to fill the place made vacant by his death. Not for the first time did the fate of an army depend upon a single man, and the fortunes of a country hang, as in a balance, on the achievements of a single

* "The Life of Gen. Albert Sidney Johnston," p. 616.