The History of the Confederate War, Its Causes and Its Conduct, Volume 2 (of 2) / A Narrative and Critical History

by George Cary Eggleston

In order to accomplish this he sent McClernand and Sherman to cut a canal across the peninsula made by the great bend in the river west of Vicksburg. This effort proved a failure, partly through engineering difficulties and partly because there were bluffs on the eastern side of the river below Vicksburg, which the Confederates promptly fortified and armed in such fashion as to command the outlet of the proposed canal.

Grant soon saw that even if he should succeed in making this canal cut-off, he must still find himself confronted on the river bank by heavily armed and high-placed works as difficult for his flotillas to pass as were the bluffs at Vicksburg itself.

He continued the work, however, in despair of anything better to do until early in March when a sudden flood in the Mississippi completely overflowed the peninsula on which the Federals were working, and compelled Sherman to withdraw hastily to save his army from drowning.

Grant's next scheme was by cutting another canal to carry his flotilla through Lake Providence west of the Mississippi, and thence by way of the many navigable bayous in that quarter to a point on the river well below Vicksburg. A good deal of digging was done in an attempt to carry out this plan, but in the end it failed as completely as the former one had done.

Grant now turned his attention to possibilities on the eastern side of the Mississippi. By blowing up a levée he tried to open again an old and abandoned waterway from the Mississippi into the Yazoo river, by way of the Tallahatchie and Yalobusha rivers. Those two streams unite at Greenwood to form the Yazoo river. They are narrow, tortuous, uncertain of channel, and densely wooded along their banks. The Confederates with their ceaseless and alert activity swarmed on the banks of these rivers, and obstructed them not only by the fire of sharpshooters, and now and then of a field battery, trained against the advancing flotilla, but still more effectively by felling trees into the stream and thus rendering it impassable. Presently Grant found also that the Confederates were engaged in a system of defense still more dangerous to him than this. While obstructing his pathway down these streams in the way described they were also felling trees into the channels in the rear of his flotilla, and constructing strong earthworks along the banks above him. It was obvious that he must withdraw at once from his perilous position or encounter something worse than a mere risk of capture.

The work of extricating himself was difficult, but with strong reinforcements continually coming to him Grant succeeded in accomplishing it.

Still he did not abandon his hope of getting into the rear of Vicksburg by some movement from the north. The Yazoo river was connected by many bayous and other watercourses on the west of Haines Bluff with its tributary, the Big Sunflower. Grant decided to go up the Yazoo to Steele's Bayou and to go on up that watercourse, through some difficult passes into the Big Sunflower; thence he planned to descend the last-named stream, and strike the Yazoo again above the fortifications at Haines Bluff. If he could accomplish this he would have an open and comparatively easy road into the rear of Vicksburg.

This effort was met and baffled, as the former one had been, by Confederate obstructions in the streams, and by ceaseless annoyance from the woodlands on the banks. So active were the Confederates that at one time Commodore Porter seriously contemplated the abandonment of all his gunboats and transports. His energy, however, and his wonderful skill in navigation saved him at last from this humiliating necessity. By backing through streams in which there was not room enough to turn around, he managed at last to retreat lobster fashion, through thirty miles of tangled and crooked waterways, under a constant and galling fire from the banks, and in the end to get back into openly navigable waters.

As a wise and discreet commander, it was Grant's habit to adopt those measures which promised success at the smallest cost of human life—these first. But as a man of indomitable courage and determination, it was his habit also, if the less costly method failed, to venture upon more desperate courses with a single-minded determination to accomplish his purposes at whatever hazard and whatever sacrifice. He was convinced now, that in order to conquer the stronghold at Vicksburg he must manage in some way to place his army on the river bank below that city in some position from which he could march into its rear. To do this involved a world of difficulty, incredible hardship, and immeasurable danger. He must somehow get his army past the town, and into a position where it would be hopelessly dependent upon such stores as he could carry with him for the maintenance of his troops from day to day.

In order to reach such a position he must take incredible risks, and, having attained it, he must find himself isolated without communications of any sort, and dependent upon complete and quick success for the very existence of his army. Having once placed himself in that position he must promptly conquer Vicksburg, or ingloriously surrender all his force.