276

· ACTION AT THE BLUFFS.

[1862.

proaches, and at the same time endure a cross-fire from the heights. Blair's brigade reached the base of the hills, but was not properly supported by Morgan's, and had to fall back again, leaving five hundred of its men behind. The 6th Missouri regiment, at another point, had also gone forward unsupported, reached the bluff, and could not return. The men quickly scooped niches in the bank with their hands and sheltered themselves in them, while many of the enemy came to the edge of the hill, held out their muskets vertically at arms'-length, and fired down at them. These men were not able to get back to their lines till nightfall. This assault cost Sherman eighteen hundred and forty-eight men, and inflicted upon the Confederates a loss of but two hundred. He made arrangements to send a heavy force on the transports to Haines's Bluff in the night of December 30, to be debarked at dawn and storm the works there, while the rest of the troops were to advance as soon as the defences had been thus taken in reverse. But a heavy fog prevented the boats from moving, and the next day a rain set in. Sherman observed the water-marks on the trees ten feet above his head, and a great deal more than ten feet above his head in the other direction he saw whole brigades of reënforcements marching into the enemy's intrenchments. He knew then that something must have gone wrong with Grant's coöperating force, and so he wisely reembarked his men and munitions, and steamed down to the mouth of the Yazoo.

1863.]

CAPTURE OF ARKANSAS POST.

277

On the 4th of January, 1863, General McClernand assumed command of the two corps that were commanded by Generals Sherman and George W. Morgan. A fortnight before, a Confederate boat had come out of Arkansas River and captured a mail-boat, and it was known that there was a Confederate garrison of five thousand men at Fort Hindman, or Arkansas Post, on the Arkansas. It occurred to Sherman that there could be no safety for boats on the Mississippi near the mouth of the Arkansas till this post was captured or broken up; and accordingly he asked McClernand to let him attack it with his corps, assisted by some of the gunboats. McClernand concluded to go himself with the entire army, and Porter also accompanied in person. They landed on the 10th below the fort, and drove in the pickThat night the Confederates toiled all night to throw up a line of works reaching from the fort northward to an impassable swamp. On the 11th the whole National force moved forward simultaneously to the attack, the gunboats steaming up close to the fort and sweeping its bastions. with their fire, while Morgan's corps moved against its eastern face, and Sherman's against the new line of works. The ground to be passed over was level, with little shelter save a few trees and logs; but the men advanced steadily, lying down behind every little projection, and so annoying the artillerymen with their sharpshooting that the guns could not be well served. When the gunboats arrived abreast of the fort and enfiladed it, the gunners

ets.

278

CUTTING A CANAL.

[1863.

ran down into the ditch, a man with a white flag appeared on the parapet, and presently white flags and rags were fluttering all along the line. Firing was stopped at once, and the fort was surrendered by its commander, General Churchill. About one hundred and fifty of the garrison had been killed, and the remainder, numbering forty-eight hundred, were made prisoners. The National loss was about one thousand. The fort was dismantled and destroyed, and the stores taken on board the fleet. McClernand conceived a vague project for ascending the river farther, but on peremptory orders from Grant the expedition returned to the Mississippi, steaming down the Arkansas in a heavy

snow-storm.

In accordance with instructions from Washington, Grant now took personal command of the operations on the Mississippi, dividing his entire force into four corps, to be commanded by Generals McClernand, Sherman, Stephen A. Hurlbut, and James B. McPherson. Hurlbut's Hurlbut's corps was left to hold the lines east of Memphis, while the other troops, with reënforcements from the North, were united in the river expedition.

McClernand and Sherman went down to the peninsula enclosed in the bend of the river opposite Vicksburg, and with immense labor dug a canal across it. Much was hoped from this, but it proved a failure, for the river would not flow through it. Furthermore, there were bluffs commanding the river below Vicksburg, and the Confederates had already begun to fortify them; so

1863.]

YAZOO PASS ATTEMPTED.

279

that if the canal had succeeded, navigation of the stream would have been as much obstructed as before. Still, the work was continued till the 7th of March, when the river suddenly rose and overflowed the peninsula, and Sherman's men barely escaped drowning by regiments.

Grant was surveying the country in every direction, for some feasible approach to the flanks of his enemy. One scheme was to move through Lake Providence and the bayous west of the Mississippi, from a point far above Vicksburg to one far below. This involved the cutting of another canal, from the Mississippi to one of the bayous, and McPherson's corps spent a large part of the month of March in digging and dredging; but this also was a failure. On the eastern side of the Mississippi there had once been an opening, known as Yazoo Pass, by which boats from Memphis made their way into Coldwater River, thence into the Tallahatchie, and thence into the Yazoo above Yazoo City; but the pass had been closed by a levee or embankment. levee, and tried this approach. ates had information of every prompt measures to thwart it. streams where his boats had to wooded, and great trees were felled across the channel. Worse than this, after the boats had passed in and removed many of the obstructions, it was found that the enemy were felling trees across the channel behind them, so that they might not get out again. Earthworks also were thrown

Grant blew up the But the Confedermovement, and took The banks of the pass were heavily

280

AN ATTEMPT BY STEELE'S BAYOU.

[1863.

up at the point where the Yallabusha and Tallahatchie unite to form the Yazoo, and heavily manned. Here the advance division of the expedition had a slight engagement, with no result. Reënforcements arrived under General Isaac F. Quinby, who assumed command, and began operations for crossing the Yallabusha and rendering the Confederate fortification useless, when he was recalled by Grant, who had found that the necessary light-draft boats for carrying his whole force through to that point could not be had.

One more attempt in this direction was made. before the effort to flank Vicksburg on the north was given up. It was proposed It was proposed to ascend the Yazoo a short distance from its mouth, turn into Steele's bayou, ascend this, and by certain passes that had been discovered get into Big Sunflower River, and then descend that stream into the Yazoo above Haines's Bluff. Porter and Sherman took the lead in this expedition, and encountered all the difficulties of the Yazoo Pass project, magnified several times-the narrow channels, the felled trees, the want of solid ground on which troops could be manoeuvred, the horrible swamps and canebrakes, through some of which they picked their way with lighted candles, and the annoyance from unseen sharpshooters that swarmed through the whole region. Porter at one time was on the point of abandoning his boats; but finally all were extricated, though some of them had to back out through the narrow pass for a distance of thirty miles.