"How strong is it?"
"We have not been able to ascertain exactly, but I think we can take it. At all events, we can try."
The hopelessly muddy roads and the falling snow were terrible to our troops, who had no tents; but Grant marched to the fort. On Wednesday he skirmished and placed his men in position; on Thursday, Friday, and Saturday, he fought from daylight until dark. On Saturday night, the sanguine General Pillow telegraphed to Nashville:
"The day is ours. I have repulsed the enemy at all points, but I want re-enforcements."
The Capture of Fort Donelson.
Before dawn on Sunday, the negro servant of a Confederate staff officer escaped into our lines, and was taken to General Grant. He insisted that the Rebel commanders were consulting about surrender, and that Floyd's men were already deserting the fort. A few hours later came a letter from Buckner, suggesting the appointment of commissioners to adjust terms of capitulation. Grant wrote in answer:
"I have no terms but unconditional surrender. I propose to move immediately upon your works."
Buckner's response, exquisitely characteristic of the Rebels, regretfully accepted what he described as Grant's "ungenerous and unchivalrous terms!" So the North was electrified by a success which recalled the great battles of Napoleon.
Grant first invested the garrison with thirteen thousand men. The enemy's force was twenty-two thousand. For two days, Grant's little command laid siege to this much larger army, which was protected by ample fortifications. At the end of the second day, Grant received re-enforcements, swelling his forces to twenty-six thousand.
From three to four thousand Rebels, of Floyd's command, escaped from the fort; others escaped on the way to Cairo, and several thousand were killed or wounded; but Grant delivered, at Cairo, upward of fifteen thousand eight hundred prisoners.