[Illustration: BATTLE OF GETTYSBURG. Contemporary drawing.]
[Illustration: THE VICKSBURG CAMPAIGN.]
[Illustration: GRANT'S HEADQUARTERS NEAR VICKSBURG. From a recent photograph.]
VICKSBURG, 1863.—In January, 1863, the Confederates held the Mississippi River only from Vicksburg to Port Hudson. The capture of these two towns would complete the opening of the river. Grant, therefore, determined to capture Vicksburg. The town stands on the top of a bluff which rises straight and steep from the river, and had been so strongly fortified on the land side that to take it seemed impossible. Grant, having failed in a direct advance through Mississippi, cut a canal across a bend in the river, on the west bank, hoping to divert the waters and get a passage by the town. This, too, failed; and he then decided to cross below Vicksburg and attack by land. To aid him, Admiral Porter ran his gunboats past the town on a night in April and carried the army across the river. Landing on the east bank, Grant won a victory at Port Gibson, and hearing that J. E. Johnston was coming to help Pemberton, pushed in between them, beat Johnston, and turning against Pemberton drove him into Vicksburg. After a siege of seven weeks, in which Vicksburg suffered severely from bombardment and famine, Pemberton surrendered the town and army July 4, 1863.
In less than a week (July 9) Port Hudson surrendered, the Mississippi was opened from source to mouth, and the Confederacy was cut in two.
[Illustration: WAR IN THE WEST, 1863-65, AND ON THE COAST.]
CHICKAMAUGA, 1863.—While Grant was besieging Vicksburg, Rosecrans forced a Confederate army under Bragg to quit its position south of Murfreesboro, and then to leave Chattanooga and retire into northern Georgia. There Bragg was reënforced, and he then attacked Rosecrans in the Chickamauga valley (September 19 and 20, 1863), where was fought one of the most desperate battles of the war. The Union right wing was driven from the field, but the left wing under General Thomas held the enemy in check and saved the army from rout. By his firmness Thomas won the name of "the Rock of Chickamauga."
CHATTANOOGA.—Rosecrans now went back to Chattanooga. Bragg followed, and, taking position on the hills and mountains which surround the town on the east and south, shut in the Union army and besieged it. Hooker was sent from Virginia with more troops, Sherman [4] brought an army from Vicksburg, Rosecrans was replaced by Thomas, and Grant was put in command of all. Then matters changed. The troops under Thomas (November 23) seized some low hills at the foot of Missionary Ridge, east of Chattanooga. Hooker (November 24) carried the Confederate works on Lookout Mountain, southwest of the town, in a fight often called "the Battle above the Clouds." Sherman (November 24 and 25) attacked the northern end of Missionary Ridge. Thomas (November 25) thereupon carried the heights of Missionary Ridge, and drove off the enemy. Bragg retreated to Dalton in northwestern Georgia, where the command of his army was given to General J. E. Johnston.
[Illustration: WILLIAM T. SHERMAN.]
[Illustration: CHARGING UP MISSIONARY RIDGE.]