THE LAND ATTACK.
In addition to the two water batteries already described, a third had been commenced, but was not at the time completed. The fort stood on a hill, and within its ample lines nearly a hundred large and substantial log-houses had been erected for quarters. In order to prevent any lodgment of an opposing force on the hills back of the fort, it was necessary to construct a line of defenses around the fort, at the distance of a mile, and in some places more than a mile, from the principal work. These outworks extended from a creek on the north side of the works to another which entered a quarter of a mile below. Both of these streams were filled with backwater from the swollen river, for the distance of three-quarters of a mile from their mouths. This chain of breastworks and the miry bed of the creeks formed a most complete impediment to the marching of an artillery force within sight of the main fort. This line of works was not less than three miles in length, breast high, and formed from a ditch on either side, so as to answer the purpose of rifle-pits and parapets. At intervals on every elevation platforms had been constructed and mounted with howitzers and light field pieces. Such were the works, defended by from 20,000 to 25,000 men, that the national troops were determined to take by assault.
Early on the morning of the 12th of February, the national troops left Fort Henry with two days’ rations in their haversacks, without tents or wagons, except such as were necessary to convey a surplus of commissary stores and ammunition, and ambulances for the sick.
The expedition under the command of Brigadier-General U. S. Grant, was divided into three columns—the division under Brigadier-General McClernand, taking the road from Fort Henry to Dover, running to the south of the enemy’s position; the second division, under command of Brigadier-General C. F. Smith, taking the direct or telegraph road to the fort; the third division, subsequently placed under the lead of Brigadier-General L. Wallace, being sent round by Paducah and Smithland, ascending the Cumberland, under the escort of the gunboats. Each of these divisions consisted of about ten regiments of infantry, batteries, and cavalry.
First Division, Brigadier-General McClernand.—1st Brigade, Col. Oglesby, acting.—8th Illinois, Lieut. Col. Rhodes; 18th Illinois, Col. Lawler; 29th Illinois, Col. Reardon; 13th Illinois, Col. Dennis; 31st Illinois, Col. J. A. Logan; Schwartz’s battery; Dresser’s battery; 4 battalions Illinois cavalry. 2d Brigade, Col. W. H. L. Wallace, acting.—11th Illinois, Lieut. Col. Hart; 20th Illinois, Col. Marsh; 48th Illinois, Col. Smith; 49th Illinois, Col. Hainey; Taylor’s battery; McAllister’s battery; 4th and 7th Illinois cavalry, Cols. Kellogg and Dickey.
Second Division, Brigadier-General C. F. Smith.—1st Brigade, Col. Cook, acting.—7th Illinois, 50th Illinois, 12th Iowa; 13th Missouri, Col. Wright; 52d Indiana; 3 batteries Missouri 1st artillery, Maj. Cavender commanding; Capts. Richardson, Stone, and Walker. 2d Brigade, Col. Lauman, acting.—7th Iowa, Lieut.-Col. Parrott; 2d Iowa, Col. Tuttle; 14th Iowa, Col. Shaw; 25th Indiana, Col. Veatch; 56th Indiana.
Third Division, Brigadier-General Lewis Wallace.—1st Brigade, Col. Croft, acting.—17th Kentucky, 25th Kentucky, 31st Indiana, 44th Indiana, Col. Hugh B. Reed. 2d Brigade, Col. Thayer, acting.—1st Nebraska, Lieut. Col. McCord; 13th Missouri, Col. Wright; 48th Ohio, Col. Sullivan; 58th Ohio, Col. Bausenwein; Willett’s Chicago battery.
By nine o’clock all the forces were on the march. The division of General McClernand took the upper or southern road to Dover. The division of General Smith proceeded by the northern or telegraph road, running directly to the fort. The route lay through broken and undulating lands. Small streams of the purest water were crossed at every ravine. The hills were in places covered with green pines and tall, heavy timber. The weather was mild and spring-like; the men in admirable spirits, marching in regular order, and the surrounding scenery almost tropical in its luxuriance. At about two o’clock in the afternoon the advanced skirmishers of McClernand’s division came in sight of the enemy’s tents stretching between the hill upon which the fort was situated, and the next, on Dover ledge.
Word was passed back to General Grant that the enemy and his camp had been sighted. General Grant at once ordered up the rear of the column. Dresser’s battery was posted on an eminence overlooking the tents, and a few shells sent into the camp. There was a general and promiscuous scattering of men from the camps into the earthworks to right and left. General Grant immediately ordered the division of General Smith into line of battle on the ravine back of the main elevation. A column of men was pushed up on the left of the fort. Scouts returned saying that the breastworks could be discovered on the extreme left. An hour or two was then spent in reconnoitering along the various hills surrounding the enemy’s position.
This preliminary skirmish was soon over, and the enemy had fallen back within his intrenchments, when the shades of night fell upon the two armies. Many of the Federal soldiers, in anticipation of an engagement, had relieved themselves of their overcoats, blankets, and haversacks, and were altogether unprepared for the experience of the night. But cheerfully kindling their camp-fires, under a mild and genial temperature, they gathered around the cheerful blaze and gradually fell into slumberous dreams of home, of conquest, or of love.
During the night the enemy made a sortie on the extreme right of the Federal lines, which by its suddenness created some confusion for the time, but he was repulsed and compelled to retire.
On Thursday, the 13th, the attack commenced. The morning sun rose brightly on the scene. The men were soon engaged in cooking what provisions could be obtained. Several hogs running at large in the woods had been shot for breakfast, and a sumptuous meal was made from their flesh. At sunrise the firing of riflemen commenced. The enemy could be descried behind his breastworks. The most available positions were selected for batteries, and by eight o’clock a regular exchange of shot and shell had commenced across the ravine which separated the combatants. Taylor’s battery was on the extreme right, next came Schwartz’s, further to the left. Further still was a section of an Illinois battery. Across a deep ravine and in the centre of the position was Captain Richardson’s First Missouri Light Artillery, on the point of a ridge provokingly near the enemy’s lines. Higher upon the same rise was McAlister’s battery of twenty-four pound howitzers, and on the left could be heard at intervals an Iowa battery.
The long established form of opening the fight by a contest of sharpshooters and artillery was observed. For two hours nothing was to be heard but the loud thuds of cannon, with the relief of a sharp crack of rifles, and an occasional report of a musket, which in the distance could hardly be distinguished from a field piece. Major Cavender, of the Missouri First, sighted his twenty-pound Parrott rifle guns. Two or three shots had been sent whizzing through the trees, when “clash” came a shot in front of the piece. Without moving a muscle the major completed his task, and bang! went a response. Bang went another from the sister-piece under the intrepid captain. A second was received from the fort, passing over the hill, exploding just in the rear, a third burst directly over head, and the combat was kept up with spirit. Dresser’s battery poured out shell from his large howitzers in splendid style. The enemy held a slight advantage in position, and had the range with accuracy. The shells were falling fast around the batteries, doing however but little injury. A few minutes and a round shot passed over the gun, and carried away the shoulder and part of the breast of artilleryman Bernhard of Richardson’s battery, killing him almost instantly. The captain shifted his position three times during the morning, whenever the enemy got his range with too much accuracy.
On the extreme right Schwartz and Taylor were blazing away fearlessly. The ground between them and the intrenchments was nearly cleared of trees, and they could observe by the smoke the position of each other with accuracy. The firing from the batteries in McClernand’s division was continuous. An attempt had been made by the enemy to capture Taylor’s battery, which had been gallantly repulsed. The rebels had reached close upon the battery, and only an incessant shower of canister saved it from capture, the infantry not being formed in position to support it effectually. The Twentieth Illinois came up in time to drive the enemy into their works.
In the afternoon General McClernand determined to make a formidable assault of a redoubt of the enemy, fronting the centre of his right. The redoubt was the only one which could be distinctly seen, owing to timber and undergrowth. At this point the ground was for the most part void of large timber, the barren extending even beyond the road on the ridge which the Union troops passed. The batteries of this redoubt had a very perfect range, and gave the troops considerable uneasiness, by blazing away at them whenever they passed over the brow of the hill. Three regiments were detailed for the work—the Forty-eighth, Seventeenth and Forty-ninth Illinois. They advanced in line of battle order, the Forty-ninth, Colonel Morrison, on the right, the Seventeenth, under command of Major Smith, in the centre, and the Forty-eighth, Colonel Hainley, on the left. Colonel Morrison, as senior Colonel, led the attack. The advance was a most beautiful one. With skirmishers arrayed in front, the three regiments swept down the hill, over a knoll, down a ravine, and up the high hill on which the redoubt was situated, some two hundred and fifty or three hundred feet in height, covered with brush and stumps, all the time receiving a galling fire of grape, shell and musketry, with a precision which would have done them credit on the parade ground. The breastworks were nearly reached, when Colonel Morrison, while gallantly leading his men, was struck by a musket ball. The captain of the company on his right was also killed, while the Forty-ninth fell into some confusion; but unappalled the Seventeenth still gallantly pressed forward and penetrated even to the very foot of the works. But it was not in the power of man to scale the abattis before them. Brush piled upon brush, with sharp points, fronted them wherever they turned; so, after a few interchanges of musketry with the swarming regiments concentrated there, the word for retiring was given. It was done in good order, by filing off to the left and obliqueing into the woods below; but many a gallant soldier was left behind underneath the intrenchments he had vainly sought to mount. They were not, however, destined to die unavenged. Scarcely, had their retiring columns got out of range, ere Taylor’s Chicago battery opened on the swarming rebel masses with shell and shrapnell. The effect was fearful. Each gun was aimed by the captain himself, and when its black mouth belched out sudden thunder, winrows of dead men fell in its track.
While this heavy firing had been heard on the right, General Smith, had ordered the enemy to be engaged on the left. The Twenty-fifth Indiana, at the head of a brigade, led the way. They had reached a position on the brow of a hill where the successful assault was afterwards made, and were met by the enemy in force, who swarmed behind the works, pouring a deadly hail of bullets and grape into them. The leading regiment broke in disorder after sustaining a hot fire, and the whole line fell back out of range. The object of the sortie had been accomplished, and the enemy’s forces drawn from the other side, but the advantage did not result, as might have been anticipated, in the occupation of the fort on the right by General McClernand.
Six companies of the famous regiment of riflemen, raised by Colonel Birge, accompanied the expedition from Fort Henry, and two companies afterwards arrived by the transports. This was a corps of picked men skilled in the use of the rifle, drawn from the North-west.
These hardy pioneers started out in the morning, with a hard biscuit in their pocket and a rifle on their shoulder, for the rebel earthworks, where they remained until relieved by a fresh gang. So adventurous were they, that many of them crept within fifty yards of the rifle-pits and exchanged words as well as shots with the enemy.
One piece in front of Dresser’s battery was kept in silence during the morning by the sharpshooters picking off their gunners. At last a shell from a Union battery, falling short, drove them away. One valiant southerner, to prove his bravery, jumped into the rampart to take aim; in an instant he was pierced by three balls, and fell out of the intrenchment, where he lay till nightfall.
The firing for the rest of the day was slow, and appeared by general consent to be abandoned. The Unionists seemed to have failed in every attempt on the fort. Wounded men were being brought in on stretchers; some limped along, supported by comrades, others staggered forward with bleeding hands and battered heads tied in handkerchiefs. The ambulances had brought in the maimed and seriously wounded. In the gray dusk of evening men came forth with spades to dig the graves of their fellow-soldiers, whose remains, stiffened in death, were lying under the pale stars.
Hardly had the camp-fires been kindled for the night when a drizzling shower set in, which soon turned into a steady fall of rain. The wind grew suddenly colder. The weather, hitherto so pleasant, was chilled in an hour to a wintry blast. Snow began to fall, and the mercury sank below freezing point.
Many of the soldiers had lost their overcoats and blankets during the day. Not a tent, except hospital tents, in the command. Provisions growing very scarce—the muddy, wet clothing freezing upon the chilled limbs of the hungry soldiers. It was a most comfortless night. Not five houses could be found within as many miles, and these were used as hospitals. Various expedients were devised to ward off the cold. Saplings were bent down and twigs interwoven into a shelter; leaves piled up made a kind of roof to keep off the snow. Large fires were kindled, and the men lay with their feet to the fire. The victims who perished of cold, exposure, hunger and neglect, on this night, will fill up a long page in the mortality record of that eventful siege.
On Friday, the conflict was maintained only by the pickets and sharpshooters, General Grant having concluded to await the arrival of additional forces, before assaulting the works.
Hitherto the investment had been made by the divisions of Generals McClernand and Smith, about ten thousand men each, including the cavalry and artillery. A third division had been sent up the Cumberland, and should, by reasonable calculation, have been opposite Fort Henry on Wednesday night. Here was Friday morning and no transports arrived. What could have befallen them? General L. Wallace, who had been left in command at Fort Henry, was summoned over, and arrived on Friday evening with two regiments of his brigade. Couriers were seen dashing along from the headquarters to the point where the boats were expected to land. About ten o’clock came the joyful intelligence that the gunboat fleet, with fifteen transports, had landed five miles below the fort. The troops from Fort Henry were pouring in, and close upon them came the troops from the boats. The men had heard something of the fighting, and moved up in splendid order, expecting to be marched directly into battle.
At about half-past two o’clock the sound as of thunder, with long reverberations in the distance, told that the river guns had at last opened their mouths, and were paying their compliments grandly to the rebel batteries. Now and then could be seen in the distance, high up in the air, a sudden puff of white smoke, which sprang as if from nothing, slowly curling in graceful folds, and melting away in a snow-white cloud; it was a bursting shell, instantly followed by the rumble of the gun from which it had been sent. The loud roar of the cannon kept growing thicker and faster. The heavy columbiads and Dahlgrens in the fort were returning the fire. One, two, three, and then half a dozen at once! The terrible game of death becomes wildly exciting!
The gunboats were advancing—the bombardment had fairly begun. The cheers went up in ten thousand voices. The death-dealing bolts of Fort Henry were falling thick and fast into Fort Donelson. But little did the besiegers know what protection and defence nature had laid against the ingenuity of art, which the insurgents had seized upon to accomplish their purpose! No one considered the importance of those great natural traverses and curtains of rock which had been thrown up by the primeval subterranean fires, nor what bomb-proofs and lunettes the waters of a thousand years had worn into the sides of those hills. The area of the place was so large that nearly the whole force could be removed from the water front, and thus leave the shells to explode against the bleak hill sides, or crush through the deserted huts of the enemy.
Meantime an occasional shot from the batteries surrounding the outer lines of defence must have told upon the enemy on the other side. The enemy replied but feebly. The entire morning had been in anxious expectancy, neither party being willing to risk the chances of another trial of valor. The weather was keen and frosty, the roads slippery and clogged with stiff mud.
Saturday, which was destined to witness the grand denouement of the painful tragedies enacted about Donelson, was cold, damp and cheerless. The enemy, during the night, had transferred several of their batteries to portions of their works, within a few hundred feet of which the extreme right wing of the Federals was resting. Upon the first coming of dawn, these batteries suddenly opened on the Ninth, Eighteenth, Twenty-ninth, Thirtieth and Thirty-first regiments, comprising Oglesby’s brigade, which had the advance. Simultaneously with the opening of the batteries, a force of about twelve thousand infantry and a regiment of cavalry was hurled against the brigade with a vigor which, made against less steady and well-disciplined troops, must surely have resulted in their entire demolition.
Sudden and unexpected as was this sally on the part of the enemy, it did not find the gallant Illinoisans unprepared to meet them. The attack was made in columns of regiments, which poured in upon the little band from no less than three different directions. Every regiment of the brigade found itself opposed to two, and in many cases to no less than four different regiments. Undismayed, however, by the greatly superior force of the enemy, and unsupported by adequate artillery, the brigade not only held their own, but upon two occasions actually drove the rebels fairly into their intrenchments, but only to be pressed back again into their former position. At last having expended every round of their ammunition, they were obliged to retire and give way to advancing regiments of Colonel W. H. L. Wallace’s brigade, the Eleventh, Twentieth, Seventeenth, Forty-fifth, Forty-eighth Illinois, and Forty-ninth Indiana regiments.
By rapid firing from the two batteries of Taylor and Schwartz, the enemy was driven back. The Union regiments which had suffered so much were withdrawn. The enemy had by this time concentrated their broken troops for another attack. General McClernand had already prepared for the emergency. Anticipating that an attempt would be made to force a passage through, he ordered a brigade to the rear and extreme right to form behind the regiments then in front.
An hour had elapsed when the enemy returned in a dense mass, renewing the fight. The battery of Captain Schwartz seemed to be the object of their attack. On they came, pell mell, with deafening volleys of fire. The Union batteries, well nigh exhausted of canister, poured a storm of shell into their ranks. Ammunition caissons were sent back in haste to get a fresh supply of canister. The Ninth, Eighteenth, Thirtieth and Forty-first were the next regiments to be brought up. The crest of the hill was contested with variable success for a full hour, when the enemy was finally driven back. The line of battle was so much confused that no connected account of the movements can be detailed. The utmost bravery was displayed on both sides, until the struggle degenerated into a wild fierce skirmish. The rebels finally retired a third time.
The Union men had expended their ammunition. It was during this lull, and before the men could realize the fact that they had driven the enemy before them, that the fourth and last attempt was made to seize the battery. The horses being shot, the enemy succeeded in gaining possession of the battery of Captain Schwartz, and were on the point of turning the guns on the Federal troops, when Captain Willett’s Chicago battery, which had just toiled up fresh from Fort Henry, arrived on the ground and poured in a perfect storm of canister, just in time to save the day. The rebels fell back in disorder, dragging the guns of Schwartz with them down the hill, and gained entrance to the fort before the Federals could overtake them. Some eager regiments followed them to the embankments, a few men climbing over, who were driven back for want of support.
The regiments which suffered most in this morning’s engagement were the Eighteenth and Eleventh Illinois; next them, the Thirty-first and Eighth. The expenditure of ammunition must have been excessive, on the hypothesis that each man had his cartridge-box full on going into action. Forty rounds of the standard cartridge is enough to fight with, and more than enough to carry with other accoutrements of battle.
There were many instances of men who displayed the utmost heroism in this action—some refused to be called off the field, fighting to the last moment; others returned after having their wounds dressed. One of the artillerymen, who received a wound, walked to the hospital, a mile or more, had the ball extracted, and then insisted on going back to his battery. The surgeon refused, when he quaintly said: “Come, come, put on some of your glue and let me go back.”
General McClernand, who had been a conspicuous mark during the whole of this fight, bore himself with firmness, exhibiting great decision and calmness in the most arduous situation. The tumult on the left having subsided, he sent a messenger back to General Grant to know if the left wing of General Smith was secure; if so he was ready to advance. As the day waned, an occasional shot was to be heard from the gunboats, but no satisfactory account could be received of their operations. A lull followed the storm. Both armies were preparing for the grand coup de main, by which Fort Donelson was to be taken.
It was resolved to storm the fort. The honor of accomplishing this difficult and perilous exploit on the left wing was given to General Smith. When Colonel Lauman led his brigade in solid columns up the steep sides of the hill, he drove the enemy from his entrenchments, pouring a fearful volley into their disorganized and broken ranks. The national ensign was immediately flung out from the earthworks, and greeted with deafening cheers from ten thousand loyal voices.
The shades of night cast their canopy over the contending hosts, and compelled the Federal commander to delay the completion of his victory till morning. Soon after daylight, the Federal columns advanced in battle array, prepared to storm the works at all points, when their eyes were greeted with innumerable white flags, thrown out by the enemy at every threatened position.
What followed may be told in few words. The enemy seeing that the Unionists had gained one of his strongest positions, and successfully repulsed him in his most daring attempts to raise the siege, took advantage of the darkness, and called a council of war, in which it was determined to surrender. With all possible haste some 7,000 troops were dispatched up the river by night. The rebel Generals Floyd and Pillow made their escape. The fort, with all its contents, fell into the conquerors’ hands. More than 13,000 prisoners, Brigadier-General Buckner, with twenty Colonels and other officers in proportion; sixty-five cannon, forty-eight field and seventeen siege guns, a million and a half dollars in stores, provisions, and equipage, twenty thousand stand of arms—was glorious result, purchased at comparatively small loss. The Federal loss in killed and wounded was 2,200; that of the rebels 1,275.
At the storming of Fort Donelson many acts of personal valor might be recorded. An instance of reckless gallantry, and fortitude under a most painful surgical operation, that of Hamilton, a son of Professor Leiber, is worthy of record. This young man was twice wounded in the battle of Fort Donelson. The first was a flesh wound, of which he made nothing. Presently, however, he was struck by a Minie ball in the same arm; this shattered his elbow, with the bones above and below, and he sank to the ground, fainting with loss of blood. He was picked up towards night, carried to a house, and thence, over a rough road, in an army wagon, to the river bank, a distance of three miles, which necessarily caused the greatest suffering. Arrived at the river bank, he was put on board a boat and conveyed with other wounded to an hospital, where his arm was amputated. When the operation was over, the brave young fellow’s first words were, “How long will it be before I can rejoin my company?” At that time young Leiber was a Lieutenant of the Ninth Illinois regiment. He was appointed aid-de-camp by General Halleck soon after the battle of Donelson as a reward for his great bravery.