As the firing ceased the Carondelet grounded, and the steam on the flagship Cincinnati having been shut off, she began drifting with the current. To Flag Officer Foote it seemed that the Carondelet was steaming ahead of the flagship, and Foote ordered her to fall back. Of course she could not do so. Foote became excited at the seeming insolence of Captain Walke, and, running forward, he shouted himself hoarse, and then a junior officer tried it also. Finally the Carondelet got free, and the matter was explained; but it is apparent, from the published memoirs of the two men, that ill-feeling prevailed between them thereafter.

Tilghman went on board the Cincinnati and surrendered to Foote, for the army under Grant was detained by the muddy roads, and did not arrive until an hour after the fort had been silenced. It was a victory for the gunboats exclusively.

The importance of taking the fort appears when it is recalled that it was a main point in the frontier chain of Confederate posts that extended from Columbus, Kentucky, on the Mississippi, east to the Cumberland Mountains. The way to the interior of Tennessee was open, and the Confederate positions at Bowling Green and Columbus, Kentucky, were becoming untenable because the Union forces were in their rear.

Foote returned to Cairo immediately with three ironclads, leaving the Carondelet at Fort Henry, while the three unarmored gunboats were sent up the river to destroy the bridge of the main line of railroad from Memphis to the East, thus cutting off rail communication between the Confederate capital and all the western parts of Kentucky and Tennessee. Lieutenant Phelps was in charge of these boats, and after reaching the bridge, he left the Taylor to destroy both bridge and trestle-work while he pushed on with the other two. Three Confederate steamers, two of which were loaded with military stores, were grounded and fired above the bridge when Phelps appeared, and there was a tremendous explosion when they blew up.

Continuing on to Cerro Gordo, near the Mississippi State line, he captured a river steamer called the Eastport, that was already partly converted into a gunboat. Further up two more steamers were captured, and three others were fired by the Confederates. The raid extended to Florence, and was one of the notably brave deeds on Western waters.

The Eastport was taken into the government service, and Phelps commanded her until she ran on a torpedo in the Red River two years later and was destroyed.

From Fort Henry the gunboats turned to Fort Donelson on the Cumberland River. This fort, although on another river, was but twelve miles from Fort Henry. It was a much stronger position. As described by Mahan, “the main work was on a bluff about a hundred feet high, at a bend commanding the river below. On the slope of the ridge, looking down stream, were two water batteries, with which alone the fleet had to do. The lower and principal one mounted eight 32-pounders and a X-inch columbiad; in the upper there were two 32-pounder carronades and one gun of the size of a X-inch smooth-bore, but rifled with the bore of a 32-pounder and said to throw a shot of one hundred and twenty-eight pounds. Both batteries were excavated in the hillside, and the lower had traverses between the guns to protect them from an enfilading fire, in case the boats should pass their front and attack them from above. At the time of the fight these batteries were thirty-two feet above the level of the river.”

Foote thought the position too strong for the gunboats because the forts could deliver a plunging fire that would strike on top, where the gunboats were not armored, but he consented to join the expedition. Meantime Grant had sent the Carondelet, Captain Walke, around in advance of the others, and she arrived within range of Fort Donelson at 11 o’clock A.M. on February 12, 1862. Grant arrived overland an hour later.