Abraham Lincoln's Gettysburg Address
Fourscore and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent a new nation, conceived in liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal. Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battle-field of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field as a final resting-place for those who here gave their lives that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this. But, in a larger sense, we cannot dedicate, we cannot consecrate, we cannot hallow this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember, what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us, that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion, that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain, that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom, and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth."
Assuming its own stature of strategic significance in the Western Theatre of the American Civil War, the Battle of Vicksburg, MS would stand as the quieter; second twin, in watershed reference points. With so much on the line for the North regarding the Vicksburg Campaign, the North's successes at Vicksburg, MS would always stand in the shadows~~~of Gettysburg, Pa.
History paints the picture of GETTYSBURG as the epic, iconic Civil War battle. In a battle that had both sides contending with questionable and doubting fits and starts, there was nonetheless, decisive strategies effected. There was included, a who's-who of military leaders, and then, facsimiles-thereof. In a battle that would have its hallowed ground, several months later, have a President standing on it to pay homage, would be the same President whose face would some day be literally etched in granite. And the fait d'accomplish!?!? When this President did come to pay homage to this hallowed ground, he would make a 282-worded speech(way-short; by political standards) where even he suggested at one point in his remarks..."the world will little note." In the aftermath of the grossest bloodshed on American soil, would come a speech whose words, context, and spirit, would redefine, or as this President solicited...'rediscover' who we are~~~as a government, a society, and as a people.
In the watershed moment of American History where this battle of Gettysburg, PA stands, there emerges another battle of enormous strategic significance and epic proportions, that plays out, in the shadow of Gettysburg.
By design; denying access to the flow of manpower, equipment, and armament on the Mississippi River, is the purpose of this fortified bastion on the southwest flank of the Confederate Heartland; Vicksburg, MS. Representing itself as the pillar of strength on the Western Flank, The Union-driven Vicksburg Campaign, under the leadership of Maj Gen Ulysses S, Grant, and his Army Of The Tennessee, was to render ineffective, the last Confederate-controlled-section---of the Mississippi River. Unlike the Battle of Gettysburg, which was a five-day affair, the siege of Vicksburg would protract for a grueling, and punishing nine months. And this siege took place in an era where the thinking had the civilian population---fair game.
Establishing a foothold so deep into the Confederate Heartland was a serious challenge. Keep in mind, the Civil War predates the Eisenhower Interstate System by almost one hundred years. To be an effective offensive advancing combative machine, everything had to be as that of a well-oiled machine. Your rear-guard(Columbus, Kentucky), your supply-line(principally, The Central Mississippi Railroad), and logistics must be ample, fluid, and have all the supply-chain-links stay intact, so that the advancing front-line momentum---remains sustained. Because of the proliferation of the railroads over the previous twenty years, wagon trains, and an enhancement of topographical reliefs, like the Cumberland Trail, brought about by our innate sub-conscious compulsion of manifest-destiny, what the habitually-drinking Major General U.S Grant pulls off, is near-genius.
Source: "Historical Times Encyclopedia of the Civil War" edited by Patricia L. Faust
From mid-Oct. 1862, Maj. Gen. Ulysses S. Grant made several attempts to take Vicksburg. Following failures in the initial attempts---the Battle of Chickasaw Bluffs, the Yazoo Pass Expedition, and Steele's Bayou Expedition, in the spring of 1863 he prepared to cross his troops from the west bank of the Mississippi River to a point south of Vicksburg and drive against the city from the south and east. Commanding Confederate batteries at Port Hudson, La., farther south prevented the transportation of waterborne supply and any communication from Union forces in Baton Rouge and New Orleans. Naval support for his campaign would have to come from Rear Adm. David D. Porter's fleet north of Vicksburg. Running past the powerful Vicksburg batteries, Porter's vessels, once south of the city, could ferry Federals to the east bank. There infantry would face two Confederate forces, one under Lt. Gen. John C. Pemberton at Vicksburg and another around Jackson, Miss., soon to be commanded by Gen. Joseph E. Johnston.
In Jan. 1863, Grant organized his force into the XI Corps under Maj. Gen. John A. McClernand, with a huge ego, and soon-to-be-rival to Ulysses, the XV Corps under Maj. Gen. William T. Sherman, the XVI Corps under Maj. Gen. Stephen A. Hurlbut, and the XVII Corps under Maj. Gen. James B. McPherson. Simultaneous with Grant's Vicksburg offensive, Maj. Gen. Nathaniel P. Banks began his maneuvering along the Red River in Louisiana. Hurlbut's Corps was subsequently transferred to New Orleans. With his three remaining Corps, Grant began operations late in March. On the 29th and 30th McClernand's and McPherson's men, at Milliken's Bend and Lake Providence, northwest of Vicksburg, began working their way south, building a military road to New Carthage, LA., preparatory to a move south to Hard Times, LA, a village opposite Bruinsburg, MS.
On the night of 16 Apr., at Grant's request, Porter took 12 vessels south past the Vicksburg batteries, losing one, to Confederate fire. On 17 Apr. Grierson's Raid began. Led by Brig. Gen. Benjamin H. Grierson, Federal cavalry left
La Grange, TN, for 16 days riding through central Mississippi to Baton Rouge, LA, pulling away large units from Vicksburg's defense to pursue them. Porter, encouraged by light losses on his first try, ran a large supply flotilla past the Vicksburg batteries the night of 22 Apr. Sherman's troops, many at work on a canal project at Duckport, abandoned this work, joined in a last action along the Yazoo River, northeast of Vicksburg, and 29-30 Apr. made a demonstration against Confederate works at Haynes' Bluff and Drumgould's Bluffs, diverting more of Pemberton's force. Also on 29 Apr., as McClernand's and McPherson's troops gathered near Hard Times, Porter's fleet assailed Confederate batteries at Grand Gulf, 33 mi. southwest of Vicksburg, testing the Grand Gulf area as a landing site for Union troops. Though Porter found the guns there too strong, he had succeeded in further diverting Pemberton in Vicksburg.
Grant had originally determined that Rodney, MS, would be the starting point of his invasion, but took the advice of a local slave and picked Bruinsburg instead. McClernand's and McPherson's corps were ferried east across the Mississippi from Hard Times 30 Apr. That day Grant sent word north for Sherman to follow McPherson's route south and join him.
On I May, the Federal invasion force engaged the Confederates in the Battle of Port Gibson. Pemberton had just over 40,000 men assigned to the Vicksburg region. Since they were scattered throughout the area, chasing Grierson and wary of Sherman, few of them could be brought to bear against Grant on short notice. Defeated at Port Gibson, Pemberton's troops moved north. Grant, to Pemberton's confusion, pushed northeast. Sherman's corps joined him 8 May, and 12 May the engagement at Raymond was fought. Johnston took personal command of Confederates at Jackson, 15 mi northeast of Raymond, 13 May. On 14 May Federals quickly won an engagement at Jackson, cut off Johnston from Pemberton, and ensured the latter's isolation for the rest of the campaign. In 2 weeks Grant's force had come well over 130 mi. northeast from their Bruinsburg landing site.
Ordering Sherman to destroy Jackson's heavy industry and rail facilities, Grant turned west, roughly following the Southern Mississippi Railroad to Bolton, and 16 May fought the climactic combat of his field campaign, the Battle Of Champion's Hill. With the largest force he had yet gathered to oppose Grant, Pemberton nevertheless took a beating there and pulled his army into the defenses of Vicksburg. In a delaying battle at Big Black River Bridge, 17 May, Confederates crossed the Big Black, destroying their river crossings behind them. Undeterred, Federals threw up their own bridges and continued pursuit the next day.
Approaching from the east and northeast, McClernand's, McPherson's, and Sherman's corps neared the Vicksburg defenses 1 8 May, Sherman's veering north to take the hills overlooking the Yazoo River. Possession of these heights assured Grant's reinforcement and supply from the North. The next day Federals made the failed first assault on Vicksburg. The second assault, 22 May, was a disaster for Union forces, showed the strength of the miles of Confederate works arching east around the city, and convinced Grant that Pemberton could only be defeated in a protracted siege.
The siege of Vicksburg began with the repulse of the 22 May assault and lasted until early July of 1863. As the siege progressed, Pemberton's 20,000-man garrison was reduced by disease and starvation, and the city's residents, already forced to seek the refuge of caves and bombproofs in the surrounding hillsides, were just as shell-shocked and war-weary. Hunger and daily bombardments by Grant's forces and Porter's gunboats compelled Pemberton to ask for surrender terms on 3 July, 1863. Grant offered none, but on the garrison's capitulation immediately paroled the bulk of the force. Many of these same men would later oppose him at Chattanooga.
Pemberton's surrender ended the Vicksburg Campaign. But during the siege, to the east Johnston had raised a 31,000 man force in the Jackson area. On 4 July, as Confederates were being paroled, Sherman moved his force to oppose this new threat. Sherman's march would result in the Siege of Jackson.
The Siege of Vicksburg (May 18 – July 1863) was the final major military action in the Vicksburg Campaign of the American Civil War. In a series of maneuvers, Union Maj. Gen. Ulysses S. Grant and his Army of the Tennessee crossed the Mississippi River and drove the Confederate army of Lt. Gen. John C. Pemberton into the defensive lines surrounding the fortress city of Vicksburg, Mississippi.
When two major assaults (May 19 and May 22, 1863) against the Confederate fortifications were repulsed with heavy casualties, Grant decided to besiege the city beginning on May 25. With no re-enforcement, supplies nearly gone, and after holding out for more than forty days, the garrison did finally surrender. This action (combined with the capitulation of Port Hudson on July 9) yielded command of the Mississippi River to the Union forces, who would hold it for the rest of the conflict. The Confederate surrender following the Siege at Vicksburg is sometimes considered, when combined with Gen. Robert E. Lee's defeat at Gettysburg the previous day, the turning point of the war. The most significant result of the campaign was control of the Mississippi River, which the Union obtained completely after Port Hudson, which had been besieged by Banks since May 27, heard news of Vicksburg's fall and surrendered on July 9. The Confederacy was now cut in two; one week later, an unarmed ship arrived in Union-held New Orleans from St. Louis after an uneventful trip down the river. President Lincoln announced, "The Father of Waters again goes unvexed to the sea. The added benefit of cutting off communications with Confederate Forces through their the Trans-Mississippi Department for the remainder of the war, was decisive.
The city of Vicksburg would not celebrate Independence Day for about eighty years, subsequent to WORLD WAR II, as a result of this devastating, demoralizing, and culturally-morphing---siege and surrender.
The blame for losing Vicksburg fell not only on John Pemberton, but on the overly cautious Joseph E. Johnston. Jefferson Davis said of the defeat, "Yes, from a want of provisions inside and a General outside who wouldn't fight." Anguished soldiers and civilians starving in the siege held hopes that he would come to their aid, but he never did. Accusations of cowardice that had dogged him since the 1862 Peninsula Campaign continued to follow him in the 1864 Atlanta Campaign against Sherman. However, Johnston was far outnumbered. While he was one of few Confederate generals whom Grant respected, he was out-generaled.
In the shadow of Gettysburg, PA, it is Maj Gen U. S. Grant's accomplishment at Vicksburg, MS that renders this lethal part of the Confederate's infallibility---to a mere foible. In doing so, Grant and his Army of the Tennessee(River), can redirect their strategies, talents, and energies to the Civil War's coup de grace; its Final Act~~~Appomattox, VA.
Historian Steven E. Woodworth wrote that Pemberton "had a strong claim to the title of the most hated man in the South, certainly the most hated to wear a Confederate uniform." There were accusations that adequate supplies had been on hand and that it was only his treachery that caused the surrender.
Confederate general Richard Taylor wrote after the war, "He had joined the South for the express purpose of betraying it, and this was clearly proven by the fact that he surrendered on the 4th of July, a day sacred to the Yankees."
Independence Day; its relevance now, even more profound.
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Hickok
The Promise
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