Blood, Tears, and Glory

Wednesday, February 13, 2008

ON THIS DAY: Thursday, February 13, 1862

The “Squirrel Tails”

Estimates vary on the number of troops facing each other at Fort Donelson on this spring-like morning: perhaps 15,000 or more Union troops outside the forts’ works; perhaps 16,000 inside the fort. Halleck is forwarding still more troops, who have yet to arrive.

“Birge’s Western Sharp-Shooters” were awake and moving about before dawn. (Pictured above: a typical sharpshooter in action, but not of Birge's force) The sharpshooters were what we call snipers, an elite force specially trained in stealth and marksmanship—ancestors of today’s Special Forces. Birge's force was the Western Theater's counterpart to the more famous "Berdan's Sharp Shooters," attached to the Army of the Potomac.

Still not a complete regiment, Birge’s force includes companies recruited from several western states, including one organized at Dayton, Ohio. Two more Ohio regiments will eventually join Birge's force.. According to Lew Wallace writing after the war, each sharpshooter carried a special long-range “deer rifle” (the “Henry Rifle”) and operated independently. This morning, after officers made sure their men’s canteens were full and they had a day’s supply of “crackers” (hardtack), the men were told, “All right; hunt your holes, boys,” and they scattered, concealing themselves behind stumps, in trees, or in holes they dug themselves.

The members of Birge’s elite were colorful to look at: instead of a regulation bullet case, they carried a bearskin pouch holding bullets they molded themselves. Although Birge's men had to wear regulation uniforms, their headgear was a gray “sugar-loaf affair,” with three squirrel tails running from front to back, meeting at the top of the crown. Nicknamed the “Squirrel Tails,” the sharpshooters were commanded by Lt. Col. John M. Birge, from St. Louis.

In early afternoon, although Grant had ordered nothing be done to bring on a general engagement, an impatient Brig.Gen. John A. McClernand—a “political general” with limited military experience—ordered repeated, failed attacks on a Confederate battery. However, the attacks may have concealed the weakness of Grant’s force.

Afternoon also brought a painful change in the weather, from spring-like to cold, sleet, and snow. Troops who had thrown away their blankets and warm clothing on the march from Fort Henry now were ill-prepared for harsh weather, and suffered greatly.

As night fell, Grant’s shivering soldiers were settling down to conduct a siege. It appeared they lacked the numbers to attack the fortification head-on, for the usual rule of thumb was that the attacking force needed three to five times--if not more--as many men as the defenders.

It is a cardinal rule in warfare, however, that nothing ever goes exactly as planned—nor would it here.

IT’S COMING SOONER THAN YOU THINK: April 12, 2011—less than 3½ years from now!—will be the 150^th anniversary of the outbreak of the Civil War. In 1861, April 12 was the day Confederates opened fire on Fort Sumter in Charleston Harbor.

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Tuesday, February 12, 2008

ON THIS DAY: Wednesday, Feb. 12, 1862

Grant advances!

By 8 a.m., Ulysses S. Grant’s troops have begun marching towards Fort Donelson, 12 miles away. Rain and mud delayed their departure by two days, but now the roads are firm enough for thousands of men and hundreds of horses—and Grant dares delay no longer.

One reason is that Grant wants to attack before Confederates have brought in too many reinforcements. But another is that Grant’s superior, Maj. Gen. Henry W. Halleck, is a nervous Nelly who at any moment could order a halt to Grant’s advance. Halleck has been feeding reinforcements to Grant without an explicit yay or nay about Donelson, but he has also indicated he’d prefer Grant remain at Fort Henry. It looks like a CYA maneuver by Halleck: if Grant takes Donelson, Halleck can share in the glory of the attack; if Grant fails, Halleck can point to his advisories against it.

So, lacking clear orders one way or the other, Grant puts his head down and pushes ahead.

After traveling about five miles, Grant’s troops are slowed by Nathan Bedford Forrest’s cavalry. Next comes plunging artillery fire. By nightfall, however, McClernand’s and Smith’s forces are camped on a high ridge facing Fort Donelson’s outer works.

The roads they had left behind, however, are littered (according to a Union major) with the “coats, pants, canteens, cartridge boxes, bayonet scabbards, knapsacks…all sorts of things that are found in the army." Grant’s inexperienced soldiers are discarding things they will need later. Feeling cocky after Fort Henry’s easy victory, these soldiers will soon encounter two challenges: an unexpected winter storm and a stout defense by Donelson’s defenders.

ELSEWHERE IN THE CIVIL WAR: Robert Caldwell writes a hurried letter to his parents in Elmore. Mitchel’s Division has received its marching orders: advance on the Confederate base at Bowling Green, Kentucky. Swallowing hard, he writes, “I am determined by the help of God to do my duty to my country [even] if I perish in the attempt.”

Monday, February 11, 2008

ON THIS DAY: Tuesday, Feb. 11, 1862

A “convocation,” not a council

In a “council of war” aboard the steamboat New Uncle Sam, docked at Fort Henry in northwestern Tennessee, Brig. Gen. Ulysses S. Grant sits and smokes silently, “but never said a word,” one of the generals—Lew Wallace (right)—later recalled of the meeting, called to plan the attack on Fort Donelson. “In all probability he was framing the orders of march which were issued that night,” sniffed Wallace, who considered the meeting “a convocation” and not a traditional council, wherein give-and-take was expected.

If General Wallace—better known today for writing Ben Hur than for his generalship—was put out by what he seemed to think was a sham council of war (to be followed in a few weeks by a serious issue between Wallace and Grant), he nonetheless sketched an accurate word picture of Grant the man. “From the first his silence was remarkable,” Wallace wrote of Grant. “He knew how to keep his temper. In battle, as in camp, he went about quietly, speaking in a conversational tone; yet he appeared to see everything that went on , and was always intent on business.”

The quiet solemnity of this man who seemed impossible to ruffle and yet was a great noticer of everything around him would be remarked upon again and again by others. To Wallace, Grant seemed supremely inner-directed, issuing orders with calm confidence and so little discussion thatt “his aides were little more than messengers.” There would be occasions as the war progressed when Grant would be more consultative, but Wallace’s description of Grant’s appearance would remain unchanged: “In dress he was plain, even negligent; in partial amendment of that his horse was always a good one and well kept.”

ELSEWHERE IN THE CIVIL WAR:

At home on furlough in Ohio since February 4, Lt. Col. Rutherford B. Hayes finally emerges to pay a visit in Columbus to visit his brother-in-law. In Washington, President Lincoln listens to a stenographic report of testimony given in the case of Gen. Charles S. Stone of Massachusetts, suspected of treason in connection with the debacle at Balls Bluff last October. Sen. Benjamin F. Wade of Ohio, chairman of the Committee on the Conduct of the War, is one of the bloodhounds dogging General Stone; War Secretary Edwin M. Stanton, also of Ohio, is another. However, most of Lincoln’s day is devoted to his deathly ill son, Willie, and son Tad, now ill as well. The White House reception usually held on Tuesdays is cancelled for this reason.

Sunday, February 10, 2008

ON THIS DAY: Monday, Feb. 10, 1862

The giant stirs

Slowly—very slowly—the northern giant in this Civil War is beginning to stir after months of somnolence.

In northwestern Tennessee, Brig. Gen. Ulysses S. Grant continues organizing his advance on Fort Donelson, now two days behind schedule—not for lack of aggressiveness on Grant’s part, but because of weather conditions.

In Washington, though distracted by family illness, President Abraham Lincoln continues to ponder how to get McClellan’s Army of the Potomac on the move. On the other hand, the commander of the Union’s biggest eastern army, Maj. Gen. George B. McClellan, ponders what to do when—McClellan believes—he is outnumbered by Confederate troops at Manassas, Virginia. If McClellan wants to find a way to get around the Confederates, he wants even more to get around Lincoln and do what he, McClellan, thinks is the way to run a war.

On Johnson’s Island, near Sandusky, Ohio, on the coast of Lake Erie, workmen are completing construction of a prison camp designed especially for officers. At the moment, many Confederate officers and enlisted men and even some civilians who have been captured in the Western Theater, are being held in one corner of Camp Chase, the big Federal training and staging area near Columbus, Ohio. But Federal authorities want to separate officers and their soldiers, thinking enlisted men without their usual leaders will be less apt to cause problems for their captors.

From the winter quarters of the 21^st Ohio in Kentucky, brothers Addison and Alfred Searles write short letters (dated February 10) to their family in Huron County, Ohio. The brothers say they have almost nothing to write about to write about and (in Addison’s words) “think that we will stay here for some time yet.” It’s one boring day after another in this man’s army.

But the brothers are about to be surprised. Apparently, they had finished their letters before another member of the 21^st, Cpl. Robert Caldwell of Company I wrote his, also dated February 10. He writes his father in Elmore, Ohio, how last night, lying on his back in bed and talking with his tent mates before they went to sleep, “tremendous cheering” was heard. “It appeared to be contagious as, the next moment, the 21^st broke out into one long, loud, hearty, ringing cheer.”

Then, “one of the boys” rushed into Caldwell’s tent with the news that the next morning they would strike their tents and start marching. “The boys” weren’t told where they were going, but they will learn soon enough that they are advancing on the big Confederate military base at Bowling Green, Kentucky. Hurrah! “The boys” are eager for action.

And in North Carolina, Brig. Gen Ambrose Burnside’s soldiers win a battle at Elizabeth City and are gaining firm control of a chunk of this Confederate state’s coastal area. Union navy vessels destroy North Carolina’s “Mosquito Fleet” of five small vessels. Having gained this foothold to use as a staging area, the question now is far inland Union forces will go. Will it be possible—as hoped—to attack Richmond, Virginia, from the south?

Saturday, February 9, 2008

ON THIS DAY: Sunday, Feb. 9, 1862

“Your plain brother”

The most important people in the life of Brig. Gen. Ulysses S. Grant are his wife, Julia Dent Grant, and their four children. They form his snug harbor of safety, support, and love. Throughout the war, he will bring them to live at his headquarters whenever it is safe to do so.

Grant’s family has been living with him at Cairo, Illinois, headquarters of his District of Cairo, but now that the general is on the warpath, Julia and the children are about to leave the war zone and join Grant’s mother, father, and sister in Covington, Kentucky.

Grant’s mother and father are two pieces of work with whom the general has an uneasy relationship. His mother is a strangely silent monolith, a brooding presence who seems to live in her own world, neither reachable nor reaching out. Father Jesse (above, right) is one of those hard-headed, hard-shell strivers with whom nineteenth-century frontier America abounded, a man who expects to use his son’s position for his own benefit and who does not hesitate to complain to Ulysses about the conduct of the war. It can be safely assumed that words of praise from either parent are rare.

So, these days, when Ulysses writes home, he likes to write his sister, Mary. Still unable to advance from Fort Henry to Fort Donelson, he sits down with pen and ink “to let you know that I am alive and well.”

He goes to explain that he writes her “a very hasty and random letter simply to let you know that I believe you still remember me and [that we are] carrying on a conversation while [I am] writing with my staff and others.” He adds, “Julia will be with you in a few days….”

The unpretentious, plain-spoken Ulysses S. Grant, something of a stoic in his quiet manner, is not often self-revelatory, but to his sister he unbends a bit:

You have no conception of the amount of labor I have to perform. An army of men all helpless looking to the commanding officer for every supply. Your plain brother however, as yet, had no reason to feel himself unequal to the task and fully believes that he will carry on a successful campaign against our rebel enemy. I do not speak boastfully but utter a presentiment.

The father is so unwilling to credit his son that perhaps the son feels the need to make a statement to home base on his own behalf.

ELSEWHERE IN THE CIVIL WAR: The Joint Congressional Committee on the Conduct of the War, headed by Ohio Sen. Benjamin F. Wade, interprets its oversight role broadly and has a tendency to interfere or raise suspicions more out of war-time anxiety than real evidence. Eager to fix blame for the Union debacle at Balls Bluff, Virginia, last October, it recommends the arrest of Brig. Gen. Charles F. Stone on suspicion of treason. On War Department orders, Stone will be imprisoned for 189 days without charges or trial, then released without explanation. To this day, Stone’s imprisonment stands as an example of the injustices and violations of civil rights that can occur because of war-time paranoia.

Thursday, February 7, 2008

ON THIS DAY: Saturday, Feb. 8, 1862

“Perfectly locked in”

Having captured Fort Henry on the Tennesssee River, today is the day Grant (right) intends to start his advance on Fort Donelson, 12 miles away on the nearby Cumberland River. The idea is to capture it before the Confederates have time send in reinforcements, but the weather is not cooperating. Grant writes Halleck’s chief of staff, “At present we are perfectly locked in by high water and bad roads and prevented from acting offensively as I should like to do.”

There is also the question of whether Halleck approves of Grant’s Donelson venture. Halleck’s original orders to Grant said nothing about Donelson, telling him only to “take and hold” Fort Henry. Nor, until two days ago, had Grant ever indicated—in telegraphic and written communication—any intention to do otherwise.

Herein lies one of the small mysteries of the Civil War, with hints of personality differences peeping through. Halleck is the quintessential desk soldier—known throughout the army as “Old Brains,” a man who knows everything there is to know about warfare but lacks the urge to actually conduct it. He is cranky, overly cautious, and a micro-manager. Grant’s quiet façade conceals a relentless aggressiveness that will, in time, win this war, but at the moment manifests itself in a determination to strike and strike again at the enemy.

It looks as if President Lincoln’s “General Order Number 1” has given the impatient Grant license to charge ahead. Since the beginning of this campaign, the tone of his wires to Halleck has been assertive, almost defiant, as if to dare Halleck to try to stop him.

Halleck is not only cautious, however, he is reluctant to give Grant the credit he is due. He wires Grant neither congratulations for Fort Henry nor explicit permission to move on Fort Donelson. Years later, Grant will write, “General Halleck did not approve or disapprove of my going to Fort Donelson. He said nothing whatever to me on the subject.”

While the published records suggests this is technically true, the records also indicate Halleck was quite aware of the Donelson move and even ordered troops to support it. But his caution kept him from committing himself to Grant in writing and his jealousy prevented sending of congratulations or even encouragement.

In his excellent study of Grant and Lee (Grant and Lee: A Study in Personality and Generalship), British Maj. Gen. J. F. C. Fuller wrote in 1957 that “the supreme value of military history is to be sought in the personalities of the generals who shaped them. At base, seven-eighths of the history of war is psychological.” That was certainly true in the cases of Grant and Halleck.

ELSEWHERE IN THE CIVIL WAR:

At this early stage of the war, Brig. Gen. Ambrose E. Burnside of Rhode Island is doing well, belying—so far—history’s poor opinion of him. In October 1861, Burnside got the go-ahead for his plan to organize a special division of troops to attack the Confederacy along the Atlantic coast. Aboard a fleet of 65 transports, escorted by warships, Burnside entered North Carolina’s Pamlico Sound and yesterday landed 7,500 troops on Roanoke Island. Today he defeated a Confederate force and took, 25,000 prisoners as well as inflicting 150 other casualties while suffering fewer than 300 himself. What was a glorious start to a campaign that could eventually take the Confederate capital of Richmond is largely forgotten—because it did no such thing.

As if President Abraham Lincoln didn’t have enough to worry about, he now agonizes over son Willie, deathly sick with typhoid. But the work of the war must go on. The President queries his obstinate, going-nowhere general in chief, George B. McClellan: “Have you any farther news from the West [regarding efforts to get Buell and Halleck to cooperate] [McClellan’s answer: No] ; “Have you determined, as yet, upon the contemplated movement we last talked of?] [Mac asks to until Monday “to give a final opinion”]

From western Virginia, Capt. Marcus Spiegel of the 67^th Ohio writes Caroline, his “Beloved Wife!”: “Tell me every little thing; you do not know how much it interests me to hear from you everything that happens…” It is the typical plea from the lonely soldier accompanied by the not-untypical reassurances to the worried wife: “Keep up spirit my love, all will be right. I will come out of this with honor and money.” Marcus closes, “Good by my sweet, my good, my dear little Cary, may God bless you and keep you in good health so that you may enjoy a many, many pleasant time in the arms and on the breast of you true and ever loving, Marcus….”

Wednesday, February 6, 2008

ON THIS DAY: Friday, Feb. 7, 1862

The Day After

There is little time for Grant to savor the capture of Fort Henry (pictured above: Fort Henry the day after its surrender). After looking over Fort Henry, Grant and his staff, escorted by some cavalry, reconnoiters his next target, Fort Donelson. He approaches within a mile, scopes out the surrounding terrain, thinks about the fort’s commanders (of whom he had a low opinion), and tells his staff he expects no serious opposition if they move quickly.

Fort Henry yielded a considerable harvest of stores, so Grant gives orders for its disposition and for the confinement of approximately 100 Confederate prisoners, including General Tilghman

Fresh from their capture of Fort Henry, Union gunboats go chugging up (south) on the Tennessee River, deep into enemy territory, to see what trouble they can cause the Confederacy.

Meanwhile, Grant’s telegraphed declaration that he will take Fort Donelson next hangs in the air, awaiting Halleck’s reply. Will the ever-cautious Halleck agree or disapprove before Grant begins his advance tomorrow?