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VISIT TO VICKSBURG AND VICINITY.

1

and other commanders during the siege. It was also a target for Confede-
rate shot and shell, by which it was much shattered. It was still in a dilapi-
dated state when we visited it, and dined with Mrs. Shirley and her daughter.
The husband and father, who was quite aged, had sunk under the operations
of anxiety, privations, and exposure in the woods, ravines, and caves during
the siege, and died soon after the city was occupied by the National troops.
The accomplished daughter kept a diary during the siege, each day's record
closing with a prediction that success would crown the efforts of the Unionists.
“The wish was father to the thought,” and her patriotism was rewarded
with the possession of the heart and hand of the gallant Colonel (afterward
General) Eaton, of the National army. At the time of our visit she was a
young bride.

From Mrs. Shirley's we rode to the head-quarters of General Grant, in the
cane-brake, and then over the rough Walnut Hills to Chickasaw Bayou, passing
the

way the house of Dr. Smith, who acted as guide to General S. D. Lee, in the fight with Sherman. He accompanied us to the theater of strife, and pointed out the various localities of interest connected with that conflict. After making a drawing of the battle-ground on the bayou, delineated on page 579, in the presence of the doctor, we left him and passed on to the Valley road, along the bottom, between the hills and the bayou, sketching the Indian Mound (see page 577) on the way, and rode into Vicksburg from the north through the deep cuts in the hills, just as a thunder-storm, which had been gathering for some time, fell upon the city. On the following morning the writer departed by railway for Jackson, and the region of Sherman's destructive march toward Alabama as far as Meridian, the stirring events of which will be considered presently.

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