CHAPTER VI.

MEMPHIS.

GRAND JUNCTION, fifty-two miles west of Memphis, and one hundred and fifty-four south from Cairo, is the junction of the Memphis and Charleston with the Mississippi Central Railway. Ninety-nine miles from Memphis, and a hundred and two from Grand Junction, the latter road joins the Mississippi and Tennessee Railway at Grenada. An army operating from Memphis as a base, and holding in force Corinth, Holly Springs, and some such point as Hernando, on the Mississippi and Tennessee Railway, are in a position to defend West Tennessee from the Tennessee River to the Mississippi, and to take the offensive against an enemy protecting Northern Mississippi.

No sooner was Corinth occupied, and the semblance of a pursuit of the enemy ended, than General Halleck ordered General Buell to march with the Army of the Ohio by Huntsville and Stevenson on Chattanooga, Tennessee, and seize the key of the debouches from the mountain region of the centre; while General Grant, again restored to the command of the Army of the Tennessee, was left in command of the District of West Tennessee and Northern Mississippi, and General Pope's troops were sent back to Missouri. The enemy was concentrated at Tupelo, Mississippi, forty-nine miles below Corinth, on the line of the Mobile and Ohio Railroad, under the command of General Braxton Bragg, who had relieved Beauregard in consequence of the latter's illness.

On the 9th of June, at Chewalla, Sherman received General Halleck's orders to march with his own division and Hurlbut's Fourth division to Grand Junction, to repair the Memphis and

Charleston Railway west of that point, and then to assume the duty of guarding the road against any attempt of the enemy to interrupt its operations. Sending forward Denver's third brigade of the fifth division, and the whole of Hurlbut's division in advance, to repair the bridges on the road, Sherman marched on the 11th with the remainder of his command, reached Grand Junction on the night of the 13th, and, finding no water there, occupied La Grange, three miles further west, on the morning of the 14th. While engaged here in repairing two pieces of broken trestle-work, he sent Veatch's brigade, of Hurlbut's and Morgan L. Smith's brigade of his own division, to Holly Springs to clear his flanks of the enemy. After driving a small force of the enemy out of the town, and as far south as Lamar, the detachment remained two days at Holly Springs, and then rejoined the main body. On the 21st, Sherman marched from Holly Springs; on the 23d, three miles west of Lafayette, met a railway train from Memphis; and on the 25th, having built two long sections of trestlework at La Grange, two large bridges at Moscow, and two small ones at Lafayette, was able to report his task accomplished, and the railway in running order from Memphis to Grand Junction. His force was then disposed so as to protect the line of the railway, Hurlbut's division at Grand Junction and La Grange, his own at Moscow and Lafayette.

On the 29th of June, in accordance with instructions received by telegraph from General Halleck, leaving one regiment and a section of artillery at each of these points, Sherman marched on Holly Springs, twenty-five miles equidistant from La Grange and Moscow, to co-operate with Hamilton's division, of Rosecrans' corps, which he was informed would reach there at a given time. Concentrating at Hudsonville by converging roads, the two divisions reached the Coldwater, five miles from Holly Springs, early on the morning of the appointed day. Denver's brigade, and the Fourth Illinois Cavalry, the latter two hundred strong, were sent forward, and drove the enemy, consisting of about fifteen hundred cavalry, through and beyond the town of Holly Springs. Nothing was

heard of Hamilton, who had approached within nineteen miles of Holly Springs and then retired to Corinth; but, on the 6th, orders were received from General Halleck to fall back to the railway and protect it, and the command accordingly returned to its former position.

Early in July, upon the appointment of General Halleck as general-in-chief of the Armies of the United States, the Department of the Mississippi was broken up, and General Grant was assigned to the command of the Department of the Tennessee, embracing the theatre of his previous operations. That officer taking advantage of the period of inactivity which now followed, turned his attention to the condition of the country occupied by his command. Memphis in particular was in a sad plight. Nearly all of its young men were in the rebel army, many of its old men had fled upon the approach of the Union troops, or in anticipation of such an event, and in their places appeared a horde of unscrupulous traders, eager to make money in any legitimate way, and deeming any way legitimate that brought them large profits. They struck hands with other men of the same stamp whom they found in Memphis ready for their use, and the city became a nest of contraband trade. Commerce and war are mortal foes. Wherever they meet or cross each other's path, one of them must die. If the trader's gold is stronger than the soldier's honor, the soldier's honor trails in the dust, war grows languid, barter dulls the sword, treason flourishes, and spies reign. If the soldier spurns the bribe, in whatever innocent shape it may creep, trade perishes, merchants walk the streets idly, or crowd the headquarters uselessly, storehouses gape vacantly or turn into hospitals, women and children starve, and the provost-marshal is king. And these things are necessarily so. War itself is so cruel that those means are most truly humane which tend to bring the contest soonest to a close, regardless of every intermediate consideration apart from its object. The general must think only of his army.

On 15th of July, from Corinth, General Grant sent tele

graphic orders to Sherman, to march at once, with his own and Hurlbut's division, to Memphis, relieve Brigadier-General Hovey in command of that place, and send all the infantry of Wallace's division to Helena, Arkansas, to report to General Curtis. Accordingly, on Monday, July 21st, Sherman assumed command of the district of Memphis, stationing his own division in Fort Pickering, and Hurlbut's on the river below, and on the 24th sent the other troops to Helena.

General Grant had strongly impressed upon him the necessity of immediately abating the evils and disorders prevailing within the limits of his new command. He was to put Memphis in a thorough state of defence. With regard to civil matters, his instructions were few. When the head of a family had gone South, the family must be made to follow. The quartermaster was to seize, and rent for account of whom it may concern, all buildings leased or left vacant and belonging to disloyal owners. All negroes working for the United States were to be registered, and an account kept of their time, so that an adjustment could afterwards be made with their owners, if the Government should decide on taking that course. It will be remembered that the Government had not yet declared, or even adopted, any definite policy with respect to the slaves in the country occupied by our forces.

Memphis was a camp of the Confederate Army, was captured by the United States Army, and was occupied and held by it as a military post. In a country, or in any part of it, held by an army in time of war, whether offensively or defensively, there is no law but the law of war. The law of war is the will of the commander. He is accountable only to his superiors. Nothing exists within the limits of his command, except by his choice. With respect to his army, he is governed by the Articles of War and the army regulations; with regard to all others, his power is unlimited, except to the extent that it may be abridged or controlled by the instructions of his Government.

Sherman permitted the mayor and other civil officers of the city to remain in the exercise of their functions, restricting

them to the preservation of law and order among the citizens, and the lighting and cleaning of the streets, and confining the action of the provost-marshal and his guards to persons in the military service and to buildings and grounds used by the army. The expenses of the local government were to be defrayed. by municipal taxes. Sherman held that all persons who remained in Memphis were bound to bear true allegiance to the United States, and, therefore, did not always exact an oath of loyalty; that they must make their choice at once between the rebellion and the Union; and that if they stayed and helped the enemy in any way, they were to be treated as spies. He required no provost-marshal's passes for inland travel, but restricted it to the five main roads leading from the city, and stationed guards on them to minutely inspect all persons and property going in or out. No cotton was allowed to be bought beyond the lines and brought in, except on contracts to be paid at the end of the war, so that the enemy might get no aid therefrom. Gold, silver, and treasury notes, when sent into the Confederate lines in exchange for cotton, always found their way, as he knew, sooner or later, voluntarily or by force, into the Confederate treasury, and were used to buy arms for the Confederate army in the British colonies. He, therefore, absolutely prohibited their use in payment. He forbade the exportation of salt, because it was used to cure bacon and beef, and thus to mobilize the Confederate army. A strict search was also made for arms and ammunition, which were often employed by the rapacious and unscrupulous traders as a means of accomplishing their ends. All able-bodied male negroes were required to work, either for their masters or for the Government, and the women and children, as well as the feeble, he refused to support or feed; but in no case did he permit any intimidation or persuasion to be used, with those who chose to leave their masters, to compel or induce them to return. With regard to all these subjects, he preferred not to meddle with details or individual cases, but laid down full, clear, and precise rules, in the form of written instructions for the guidance of his subordinates, and left the execution to