By making himself master of the two rivers he had completely destroyed the Confederate line and scheme of defense. He had completely cut off that part of the Confederate force which had its headquarters at Bowling Green from that part of it whose chief seat was at Columbus. So complete was this severance, as a glance at a map will show, that General Albert Sydney Johnston sent General Beauregard at once to command the western force as a separate army with specific instructions to act upon his own judgment, bearing in mind that coöperation between the two forces was no longer possible.
It was surely a great strategic victory for Grant thus to break an elaborate line of defense and thus completely to divide an army already inferior to the armies opposing it in numbers, resources and equipments. But this was not all of it. By this division of the Confederate forces Grant was left free to attack either half of the Southern army at will, with overwhelming numbers—for in addition to his own 38,000 men—for his force had been swelled to that strength—he had Buell's much larger force within easy call, to say nothing of Thomas's command, now foot-loose for aggressive campaigning. It is safe to say that had Grant been permitted, he could and would have fallen upon and crushed the Confederates under Johnston, with an absolutely overwhelming army. He could and would have conquered every remaining Confederate stronghold in Tennessee and northern Georgia and Alabama and he could and probably would have made within the first year of the war that "march to the sea," either at Mobile or at Savannah, which was left for Sherman to make years later.
On the other hand, with a strong detachment he could easily have destroyed the long and exceedingly vulnerable line of communication that connected Columbus, Kentucky, with the South.
At Jackson, Tennessee, the Mississippi Central railroad coming up from New Orleans and the Mobile and Ohio line running north from Mobile formed a junction. From that point north to Columbus, there was but one fragile line of single track, earth-ballasted railroad, serving as a connecting link between the South and its excessively advanced western position at Columbus. It is difficult to imagine a line of military communication more vulnerable than this little thread. The country between the Tennessee river and this railroad line was quite open and there was neither fortress nor force, except here and there an easily conquerable picket post to defend the communication. If Grant had been left with a free hand there is no doubt whatever that he would instantly have sent westward a force too small in itself for its detachment to weaken him, but large enough to make itself instantly and completely master of this railroad line. He would thus have cut off all communication between Columbus and the South. He would have made himself quickly master of all the forces and all the supplies and all the ordnance that had been foolishly concentrated at Columbus. He would without a battle have compelled the surrender of that stronghold, with all its preposterously numerous garrison, with all its great guns, and with all of the rich store of supplies and ammunition and other war material collected there.
It was another absurdity of the early war that Grant was forbidden to do any of these things, when the time for their doing was ripe. By orders of his "superior officer" Halleck, Grant was held idle at the forts that he had conquered while this opportunity slipped away. From the sixteenth of February to the thirteenth of March this only general who knew how to do things and how to get things done was condemned to idleness and inaction by the absurd order of a distinctly unfriendly martinet.
In the meantime the Confederates, not being fools, utilized the opportunity given them by this delay, to rescue themselves from their peculiarly perilous position. Johnston withdrew the eastern half of the Confederate army from Bowling Green to the line of the railroad that led from Memphis eastward. Beauregard, in command of the western half of the army which Grant had so completely sundered, clearly saw the situation and promptly retired his forces from Columbus to Corinth, Mississippi, on the line of the Memphis and Charleston railroad at its intersection of the Mobile and Ohio line. He had in the meantime transferred to New Madrid on the Mississippi, and to Island Number 10 in that stream, the best of the ordnance in Columbus, thus providing as effectually as he could for the defense of the great river and for its blockading against Federal gunboats and still more important Federal transports bearing troops and supplies to points below.
Corinth is a little village in the extreme north of Mississippi. It has no pronounced defensive advantages whatsoever. It lies in a region of nearly flat lands with no line of bold hills to protect it and no difficult stream to serve as a base of defense. But it lies upon that line of railroad which the Confederates must defend if they were to preserve their communications between the east and the west at the crossing of the north and south line.
At Corinth the Confederates concentrated all their forces. Against Corinth Grant instantly directed his operations as soon as he was restored to command and permitted by his superior officer to carry on the war for his country upon lines marked out by common-sense.
He moved at once to Pittsburg Landing on the Tennessee river. Pittsburg Landing lies about twenty miles north by east of Corinth and between the two there is no considerable stream, no important range of hills, nothing in the shape of physical conformation of the ground that could aid Confederate defense or facilitate Confederate aggression. On the contrary the streams near Pittsburg ministered exclusively to Federal purposes.
When Grant arrived at Pittsburg Landing he found the army encamped about equally upon the eastern and western sides of the river. He instantly and boldly ordered the whole of it to the western or Confederate bank of the stream.